2022 Session Descriptions

Keynotes

The Upside Down World and Sustainability of Open Education

Speaker: Karen R. Cangialosi, Program Director, Regional Leaders of Open Education Network

More intentionally and broadly moving the emphasis from OER to Open Educational Practices is the most important shift needed for the open education movement right now, at least in the United States. However, only through transformative open pedagogies that directly address cultural, social, political, and environmental injustices can we see a sustainable future for open education, and more importantly, a sustainable future for higher education, our democracy, and the planet.

How do we revitalize the OER movement and not become complacent with our success to date? A Call to Action

Speaker: Robert J. Awkward, Assistant Commissioner for Academic Effectiveness, Massachusetts Department of Higher Education

Open Educational Resources (OER) have served as a disrupter to the current oligopolistic publishing market. As result, the costs of textbooks and instructional materials have declined, more students have access to their learning materials day one and, as a result, student learning has improved—especially for minoritized students—according to recent studies. Yet, the growth of awareness and adoption of OER has leveled off. There is no current sustainable economic model for open. OER is supported by and dependent on foundations and higher educational institutions. The publishers, through the use of inclusive access and automatic billing, have adapted to OER and continue to attempt to achieve profit maximization. Thus, we must all begin to think about where OER is going in the current eco-system. How can we build a sustainable economic model? Given the pressures higher educational institutions are feeling from declining enrollments; changing demographics; faculty feeling overworked and under-recognized for their contributions, especially during Covid; and the need to provide more services to ensure student success with declining state and federal support, how does OER not just survive as a part of the marketplace, but thrive? These are the issues we will explore and consider. This presentation is not intended to provide the answers, but to serve to catalyze for us all to think about the issues and possibilities.

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Sponsor Presentations

The Impact of Social Annotation on Learning

Presenter: Eryn Barker, Lead Customer Success Specialist for Hypothesis

Social annotation is the act of annotating online texts together. Using social annotation, students and professors can make meaning of text, have conversations around and with the text, and work together to become more proficient readers of academic material. During this session, you will be introduced to social annotation and the various ways it can impact student learning in your courses.

Making OER textbooks engaging and adaptive with OpenClass

Presenter: Alec Kretch

OER textbooks save students across the country hundreds of thousands of dollars each year. But affordability should never come at the expense of quality. OpenClass empowers authors of OER textbooks to pair their learning content with mastery-based assignments that can easily be shared with other educators. And best of all, it’s completely free to use. Learn more during this session.

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Panel Presentations

A Texas Path to Advancing a Statewide Ecosystem for Open Educational Resources

Presenters: Judith Sebesta, Digital Higher Education Consortium of Texas

This presentation will give an overview of Advancing an Ecosystem for Open Educational Resources: OER in Texas Higher Education. This biennial survey is a collaboration between the Digital Higher Education Consortium of Texas, the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board, and the Institute for the Study of Knowledge Management in Education. The 2021 OER landscape survey was administered to all 158 two- and four-year public and independent, as well as 11 health-related, institutions across the state.

The survey analysis, building on findings from the 2019 OER landscape survey, shows, among other insights, continued growth in commitment to OER across the state. Furthermore, about one-third of institutions across the state are beginning to provide comprehensive, systems-based supports for OER by engaging multiple offices and roles on campus.

At the same time, the survey findings reveal insights into priority areas and challenges for some institutions as they work to advance OER adoption and use, including the importance of increasing both 1) faculty buy-in in and participation in OER professional learning in order to grow OER adoption, and 2) participation in statewide OER support initiatives.

The report concludes by outlining opportunities for addressing existing barriers to OER scale, and for advancing the work being done by the state’s OER champions—including new collaboration, professional learning, funding, and curriculum development supports focused on building an OER ecosystem within and across Texas institutions.

After this overview, attendees can share their work and ideas to conduct research and build an OER ecosystem in their own contexts.”

Audience: Faculty, Librarian, instructional designer, Administrator, Staff, Other

Level: All

• Judith Sebesta, Ph.D., is the Executive Director of the Digital Higher Education Consortium (DigiTex), based at Austin Community College. She also serves as the President of the Executive Council for the Community College Consortium for OER and represents DigiTex in the national DOERS3 (Driving OER Sustainability for Student Success) Collaborative.
• Michelle Singh, Ph.D., is Assistant Commissioner of Digital Learning at the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board. Prior to this position, she served as Associate Vice President of Teaching & Learning Technologies at Texas A&M University – Corpus Christi.
• Kylah Torre, Ph.D., is a program director with the Division of Digital Learning of the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board. Torre brings to that position professional experience in education research, curriculum development, and teaching. Her work in digital learning is a natural extension of a career working towards equity and accessibility for all students.

Increasing Queer and Transgender Inclusion in OER

Presenters: Stephen G. Krueger, Dartmouth College and Kat R. Klement, Bemidji State University

As OER usage grows, instructors have an opportunity to build course content that is fully reflective of a multicultural, diverse society. In this session, we discuss the particular importance of designing and utilizing OER that are queer and transgender inclusive using a Human Sexuality course as a case study. We offer both a faculty and librarian perspective in seeking out queer/trans inclusive materials, methods for evaluating existing sources, and give recommendations for best practices.

The session will start by checking in with attendees about their current understanding of OER and queer and trans issues. The first section is an overview of why queer and trans topics need attention to be adequately covered in OER, due to systemic historical (and ongoing) erasure and marginalization of these identities. Next, we will walk attendees through what to look for when evaluating sources for queer and trans inclusion; this section includes distinction between the needs of different disciplines as well as practical examples from a Human Sexuality course. The third section covers where to find new materials and how to assess them, with a focus on practicality. To conclude, we will discuss some general recommended practices. There will be time for questions at the end, and attendees will be encouraged to ask them during the session as well.

This session is designed to be useful for people at all levels of knowledge about OER. The content will not be confusing for beginners, and experts will find the queer and trans inclusion lens valuable.

Audience: Faculty, Librarian, instructional designer, Staff

Level: All

• Stephen G. Krueger (he/him) is the Scholarly Publishing Librarian at Dartmouth College, where he supports the use and creation of open access materials. He is the author of Supporting Trans People in Libraries, co-editor of Trans and Gender Diverse Voices in Libraries (forthcoming 2022), and co-author of the Trans Advice Column. Increasingly, he is working to bring values of gender inclusion into scholarly communications and open access practices.
• Dr. Kat Klement (they/them) is an Assistant Professor of Psychology at Bemidji State University, teaching courses primarily related to research methods, social and personality psychology, and sex and gender. Their major research interests include sexual violence, how transphobia relates to other systems of oppression, and transgender patients’ experiences in healthcare. They are also co-founder and co-director of the Northwoods Queer Outreach, an initiative that aims to increase queer and transgender representation, support, and acceptance across campus and within the Bemidji community.

Opening OER to New and Existing Practitioners

Presenters: Elizabeth Arestyl, CUNY Queens College and Rachael Nevins, CUNY Queens College

In Summer 2021, funding was approved for the creation of four CUNY (City University of New York) OLS (Office of Library Services) fellowships; two for OER and two for Scholarly Communications. We are students in the Graduate School of Library and Information Studies at Queens College, CUNY. As OER fellows we were tasked with familiarizing ourselves with the CUNY Pressbooks installation and building a CUNY Pressbooks guide for use in training campus OER reps and faculty OER fellows and supporting the projects they plan to build within the platform. Traditional textbook publishing is disconnected from actual classrooms. Typically, the people who build and buy the product are not the people who use it. When we consider the implications of inclusion, we must consider the additional steps needed to provide an equitable educational experience for students in Opportunity Programs: cost and visibility. The OER training sessions on the CUNY Pressbooks installation facilitate the creation of course materials that center the experiences of marginalized students and include them in ways that are still not apparent in traditionally published texts.

Audience: Faculty, Librarian, instructional designer, Administrator, Staff

Level: All

• Elizabeth Arestyl is a graduate student in the Queens College Graduate School of Library and Information Studies program. She currently works with the Queens College SEEK (Search for Education Elevation and Knowledge) program as a supplemental instructor and writing consultant, developing learning materials and presenting workshops for SEEK students and is an OER fellow with the CUNY Office of Library Services.
• Rachael Nevins has designed, written, and edited instructional materials and assessments for students in kindergarten through adult learners, as both a director of development and freelance writer and editor. She has a master’s degree in English Education from Teachers College, Columbia University and is a student in the Graduate School of Library and Information Studies at Queens College, CUNY. She is an OER Fellow with the CUNY Office of Library Services and an Open Knowledge adjunct in the library at Borough of Manhattan Community College.

Hy-Flip Blend: Composing Hybrid Pedagogies On-the-fly

Presenters: Zan Walker-Goncalves PhD., Franklin Pierce University; Paul Jenkins, Franklin Pierce University; Christopher Previte, Franklin Pierce University; and Phillip Lemos, Franklin Pierce University

What do you get when you start a campus-wide digital literacy initiative; add an inaugural Office of Diversity, Inclusion, and Equity; and offer support to pilot Open Educational Resources to the First- and Second-Year Composition Director?

A Composition curriculum grounded in Anti-Racist Assessment Ecologies (Innoue) and Open Pedagogy, offered in a hybrid/hyflex architecture using OER. A Hy-Flip Blend.

This is the story of a small diversified private university on the edge: multivocal, involving players taking risks, collaborating, and experimenting, on-the-fly.

The Library Director sets the scene and introduces the characters: the securing of a multi-year digital literacy grant training 3 cohorts of faculty, full- and part-time, a hair before the pandemic began.

The inaugural Center for Teaching and Learning Director/Digital Media Design Coordinator/Faculty offers the structural platform for the story where students and faculty seamlessly shift between synchronous and asynchronous, able to learn in real-time, in person or remote, anytime from anywhere.

The Composition Director, early adopter of open pedagogy, anti-racist assessment, and digital literacy, invites Composition Instructors only two months before the Spring 2022 semester to collaborate and “write the story,” to vision, build, and pilot the curriculum.

The Veteran Part-time Instructor explains just how piloting an OER text fits/not with the Hy-Flip Blend and importantly whether it works for Second-Year Composition students.

Beginner through advanced participants will at every stage of the story use online polling to grasp WHAT/HOW the Hy-Flip Blend works, meet in breakouts to compose alternate endings to this unfinished story, and assess the work.”

Audience: Faculty, Librarian, instructional designer

Level: Beginner

• Zan Walker-Goncalves received their Ph.D. in Composition and Rhetoric from University of Massachusetts, Amherst and is Associate Professor and Director of First- and Second-Year Composition at Franklin Pierce University. They are a member of second cohort of the university-wide digital literacy initiative. As an active member of the Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Council, in its many iterations over the last two decades, Zan has worked across the curriculum with colleagues and undergraduates to research how and why DEI is central to all programs at the institution. Zoom Cross-Atlantic is a semester-long project that connects students at Franklin Pierce University with students at the American University in Cairo. This project is in its second semester and explores writing, rhetoric, and digital literacy in an intercultural context. Zan’s publications include Sexuality and the Politics of Ethos in the Writing Classroom (SIUP).
• Paul Jenkins received his MLS from the University of Wisconsin in 1987 and has been a library director for the last twenty-seven years. He has also served as an instructor on a regular basis over the years, teaching courses on Charles Dickens, Collection Development, Information Retrieval, and the Beatles. During his career Jenkins has led and organized numerous large-scale projects. These include integrating the IT Help Desk into library services, creating and leading a campus-wide information literacy learning community, and helping to revise an existing shared governance structure. At his former institution, Jenkins also twice served as chair of the executive committee of faculty assembly (President of the faculty) and was selected one year as its outstanding scholar. He was chosen as the New York Times Librarian of the Year in 2006. Jenkins has published four books and nineteen articles that cover music and librarianship.
• Christopher Previte is an Associate Professor of Digital Media Design and the Director for Teaching and Learning at Franklin Pierce University. He earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts from the Massachusetts College of Art and Design and a Master of Fine Arts from the Vermont College of Fine Arts. Christopher has taught and developed many courses including Data Visualization; UX, Web and Mobile Design; Digital Storytelling; Audio and Video for the Web; Visual Literacy; and Digital Illustration and Image Creation. He is an artist, designer, writer, and photographer who has enjoyed working creatively for over thirty years. His current practice explores themes of loss, responsibility, and impermanence through storytelling. Christopher believes that design education should be adaptable and nimble and that the best solutions are platform agnostic.
• Phil Lemos teaches English Composition at Franklin Pierce and Southern New Hampshire universities, and creative writing at Clark University. He has MFAs in fiction and creative nonfiction from Fairfield University and SNHU. He’ll be receiving a certificate this year in Clark’s Diversity & Inclusion Program. His short story “AdMerica” will be published in the forthcoming issue of Meat for Tea: The Valley Review. He’s currently enrolled in a post-graduate program at SNHU to finish revisions on a novel.

Open Pedagogy, a Student’s Perspective

Presenters: Kiyana-Nicole Smith; Nelly Gonzalez, Eastern Connecticut State University; Tyler Fairbanks, Eastern Connecticut State University; and Maya Vanderberg, Eastern Connecticut State University

Students discuss their experiences with Open Pedagogy. Our main objective is to share our knowledge and encourage other to use Open Pedagogy.

Audience: Faculty, Other

Level: Beginner, Intermediate

• Tyler S. Fairbanks My name is Tyler S. Fairbanks. Studying Sociology at Eastern, I aim to work others to construct a better world than the one I was born in. To do so, I would like to take on the barriers within the systems that govern our lives. Currently, I work as a SOAR Benefits Specialist helping people apply for disability benefits to remedy financial barriers. Open Pedagogy is yet another invaluable tool to fixing another key system in our nation: the educational system.
• Nelly González Nelly González is a senior at Eastern Connecticut State University. She is majoring in Early Childhood Education and Sociology and is currently doing student teaching in Manchester public school. She is passionate about the different resources available in different communities. Upon graduation, she looks forward to promoting family engagement in and outside of the classroom.
• Kiyana-Nicole Smith Kiyana-Nicole Smith (she, they) is a sophomore at Eastern Connecticut State University, studying Pre-Early Childhood Education and Sociology. Kiyana-Nicole shares her joy and time through campus involvement. Volunteering in the community may help her finalize what age group she would like to teach. Kiyana-Nicole is passionate about people and helping them in any way she can.
• Maya Vanderberg Maya Vanderberg (she/they) is a junior at Eastern Connecticut State University, working towards a Bachelor’s in Sociology and Pre-Law. She works on campus in the Dean of Arts and Science’s office, and she is the Public Relations Officer for the Honors Club. Maya is currently developing her undergraduate thesis on the effects of criminalizing statutes on homeless community members. She has been involved with a myriad of Open Educational Resource projects throughout her undergraduate career and maintains a passion for promoting the accessibility of educational materials.

DHE Statewide OER Advisory Council: Course Marking Implementation

Presenters: Dr. Robert Awkward, Mass. Department of Higher Education; Amy Clinard, Bunker Hill Community College; Ceit De Vitto, Bunker Hill Community College; Sue Tashjian, Northern Essex Community College

This panel will explore the Course Marking Implementation Guidelines that were developed by the Statewide OER Advisory Council for public higher education. The panel will be led by Dr. Robert Awkward who is the Assistant Commissioner for Academic Effectiveness at the Mass. Department of Higher Education and OER Statewide Coordinator. The panel includes faculty, staff, and administrators that will talk about their experience with course marking at their colleges.

The Course Flagging Guidelines are important guidelines that help colleges and universities to flag OER courses in the state of Massachusetts. In this session, the panel will review the guidelines, look at the faculty perspective (why should they use OER in their classes), look at how colleges have implemented OER programs, and give advice on how to develop an OER plan.

The panel will have a question and answer session at the end of the session. .”

Audience: Faculty, Librarian, instructional designer, Administrator, Staff, Other

Level: Advanced

• Dr. Robert Awkward, Assistant Commissioner for Academic Effectiveness, Mass. Department of Higher Education Email: rawkward@dhe.mass.edu Dr. Robert J. Awkward is the Assistant Commissioner for Academic Effectiveness for the Massachusetts Department of Higher Education. In this role, he directs two statewide programs for public higher education; a) increasing the adoption, adaptation, and creation of open educational resources that serve to lower the costs of textbooks and ancillaries and increase student learning, persistence and completion; and b) advancing and deepening the culture of learning outcomes assessment in order to increase student learning Bob is also the Co-PI for a Department of Education Open Textbook Pilot federal grant program along with a consortium of six public institutions that is funding faculty to adapt and create inclusive, accessible and culturally relevant open textbooks that align with our marketplace needs. Robert is a tenured professor of business administration (currently on leave) at Middlesex Community College. He also serves as a visiting professor and program coordinator for the Masters in Human Resources program at Framingham State University. Finally, Bob graduated with B.A. in Political Science and a M.S. in Economic Policy & Planning from Northeastern University; a M.Ed. in Human Resources Development from Boston University; and a Ph.D. in Higher Education from the University of Massachusetts Boston.
• Amy Clinard, Assistant Professor, Department of Behavioral Sciences & Adjunct Faculty Facilitator, Bunker Hill Community College Amy Clinard is an Assistant Professor of Psychology, as well as the Adjunct Faculty Coordinator, in the Behavioral Sciences Department of Bunker Hill Community College. Her academic background centers around child and adolescent development. Amy has been implementing OER into her courses since 2017, and supports many other faculty in her department in adopting openly licensed materials. Email: alclinar@bhcc.edu
• Ceit De Vitto, Senior Special Programs Coordinator for AIDE at Bunker Hill Community College Email: kmdevitt@bhcc.edu Ceit De Vitto is the Senior Special Programs Coordinator/ Digital Learning and OER at Bunker Hill Community College, in the Academic Innovation and Distance Education (AIDE) department. She works closely with faculty, staff, and students to advocate for OER on campus. In her role, she provides professional development opportunities for faculty and staff in OER. She also works with faculty to adapt, adopt, and create robust inclusive OER/no-cost/low-cost Instructional materials. On a statewide level, she is a member of the Massachusetts Department of Higher Education’s OER Advisory Council and serves on the Course Flagging Committee, which developed the Course Flagging Guidelines. Ceit holds an M.E.d in Instructional Design from UMASS Boston. She has a Creative Commons Certificate and a Quality Matters certificate.
• Sue Tashjian is the Coordinator of Instructional Technology and Online Learning at Northern Essex Community College. In this role, she supports faculty with all aspects of online course design and development – as well as their instructional technology needs. She is a certified Quality Matters facilitator. Sue serves as co-chair of NECC’s Textbook Task Force and provides leadership for the campus’ open education initiative – the Adopt Open project. On a statewide level, she serves as co-chair of the Massachusetts Department of Higher Ed’s OER Advisory Council and was the Coordinator of the Massachusetts Community Colleges Go Open project. She is a member of the New England Board of Higher Ed’s OER Advisory Council and is currently the Co-PI for a Department of Education Open Textbook Pilot federal grant program along with a consortium of six public institutions that is funding faculty to adapt and create inclusive, accessible and culturally relevant open textbooks that align with our marketplace needs. On the national level, Sue served on the Executive Council of the Community College Consortium for Open Educational Resources (CCCOER) as co-President. Email: stashjian@necc.mass.edu

Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion-centered OER creation: A collaboration across six public higher education institutions

Presenters: Millie Gonzalez, Framingham State University; Robert J. Awkward, Mass. Department of Higher Education; Jacalyn Kremer, Fitchburg State University; Sue Tashjian, Northern Essex Community College; and Jess Egan, Holyoke Community College

This panel will speak to the unique structure of the multi-year, multi-institutional Textbook Success Pilot program in Massachusetts: Remixing Open Textbooks through an Equity Lens (ROTEL): Culturally Relevant Open Textbooks for High Enrollment General Education Courses and Career and Professional Courses at Six Public Massachusetts Colleges. Panelists with multiple perspectives will discuss the many moving parts to achieve an ambitious goal of adapting and creating 72 open textbooks within three years. OER users of all levels (All) are welcome.

We will begin by giving a brief overview of the grant project, our infrastructure, and our process for establishing cultural and marketplace relevance as a core component of our content creation.

Panelists will speak to the professional development partnerships we have made with Rebus, acquisition of the Pressbooks Content Management System (CMS), construction of an Industry Advisory Board, and our goals in alignment with the COUP framework (Cost, Outcomes, Usage, Perceptions). Panelists will also take a deep dive into the uniqueness of this grant work: centering equity, diversity, and inclusion; building support teams across six institutions; and prioritizing accessibility.

We will share the Key Performance Indicators developed for this project and their importance to assessing impact using a COUP Framework (i.e., Cost, Outcome, Usage, and Perceptions). Attendees will participate in an interactive activity to reflect on potential opportunities for OER at each individual institution.

Audience: Faculty, Librarian, instructional designer, Administrator, Staff, Other

Level: All

• Millie Gonzalez, MLS, is the Library Dean of the Henry Whittemore Library at Framingham State University. In this role, she oversees all aspects of the Library and leads library initiatives relating to OER, equity and inclusion, and sustainability. Millie is the co-chair of Framingham States’s OER Taskforce and is the co-chair of the Massachusetts Department of Higher Education’s OER Advisory Council. She is the lead PI of the Department of Education’s Open Textbook Pilot $460,000K federal grant “Remixing Open Textbooks through an Equity Lens (ROTEL). The grant is managed by a consortium of 6 public higher education institutions across Massachusetts. Email: vgonzalez@framingham.edu
• Sue Tashjian is Coordinator of Instructional Technology and Online Learning at Northern Essex Community College. In this role, she supports faculty with all aspects of online course design and development – as well as their instructional technology needs. She is a certified Quality Matters facilitator. Sue serves as co-chair of NECC’s Textbook Task Force and provides leadership for the campus’ open education initiative – the Adopt Open project. On a statewide level, she serves as co-chair of the Massachusetts Department of Higher Ed’s OER Advisory Council and was the Coordinator of the Massachusetts Community Colleges Go Open project. She is a member of the New England Board of Higher Ed’s OER Advisory Council and is currently the Co-PI for a Department of Education Open Textbook Pilot federal grant program along with a consortium of six public institutions that is funding faculty to adapt and create inclusive, accessible and culturally relevant open textbooks that align with our marketplace needs. On the national level, Sue served on the Executive Council of the Community College Consortium for Open Educational Resources (CCCOER) as co-President. Email: stashjian@necc.mass.edu.
• Dr. Robert J. Awkward is the Assistant Commissioner for Academic Effectiveness. In this role, he directs two statewide programs for public higher education: a) advancing and deepening the culture of learning outcomes assessment in order to increase student learning, and b) increasing the adoption, adaptation, and creation of open educational resources that serve to lower the costs of textbooks and ancillaries and increase student learning, persistence and completion. Robert is a tenured professor of business administration (currently on leave) at Middlesex Community College. He also serves as a visiting professor and program coordinator for the Masters in Human Resources program at Framingham State University. Finally, Bob graduated with B.A. in Political Science and a M.S. in Economic Policy & Planning from Northeastern University; a M.Ed. in Human Resources Development from Boston University; and a Ph.D. in Higher Education from the University of Massachusetts Boston. Email: RAwkward@dhe.mass.edu
• Jess Egan currently serves as Coordinator of Instructional Design at Holyoke Community College (HCC). In this role, she supports 300 faculty members, offers professional development and training opportunities, and enthusiastically supports OER creation. Jess has a deep commitment to supporting vulnerable populations with culturally responsive OER and experience in authoring and supporting the design of OER textbooks with an equity lens. Over the past five years, Jess has supported the design and delivery of over 100 courses with OER components. In 2021, Jess launched the inaugural HCC OER Faculty Champions program, which is projected to save students $97,000 within one academic year. Jess is also a member of the statewide MA OER Advisory Council and serves as the co-chair of the marketing and education sub-committee. Her involvement with the Advisory Council and as a member of the ROTEL Open Textbook Coordinating Council (OTCC) has contributed to the creation of OER textbooks aligned to HCC’s goal of better supporting the diverse population. Email: jegan@hcc.edu
• Jacalyn Kremer, MLS, is the Dean of Amelia V. Gallucci-Cirio Library at Fitchburg State University. Ms. Kremer oversees all aspects of the library and archives services. She leads the OER initiatives on campus and is chair of Fitchburg’s Open and Affordable Education Committee. She co-led an OER community of practice of Fitchburg faculty. She also co-created the development of the state-wide assessment key performance indicators for Massachusetts public higher education. Ms. Kremer was the lead investigator on a 2020 Davis Foundation Presidential Grant of $25,000 to fund OER initiatives.She serves on the ROTEL Open Textbook Coordinating Council (OTCC). Email: jkremer@fitchburgstate.edu

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Roundtable/Special Interest Group Discussions

Private, but Open? OER Initiatives at Private Colleges and Universities

Presenters: Saskia A. Kusnecov, Babson College and Billy Tringali, Babson College

The goal of this roundtable session is to engage participants in a conversation about their experiences starting homegrown OER initiatives at private institutions.

This roundtable is inspired by our own ongoing experience starting an OER initiative at a small, private college with a specialized curriculum. While OER is woven into our departmental initiatives, there is no college-wide mandate. And while our state is a member of OEN, there is no governmental directive for private institutions of higher education to create plans to cut materials costs for students. We are interested in having this conversation with our peers, so that we may share and learn from each other’s experiences of building a grassroots OER presence or community at our institutions.

The discussion is geared towards faculty, librarians, and other higher education professionals who are involved or thinking of becoming involved in creating OER initiatives at their institution. We would facilitate the discussion using polling software and breakout rooms, so that participants can be actively engaged and feel comfortable sharing their experiences. Our ultimate goal is that participants walk away with helpful resources, insights, and connections in the larger OER community.

Audience: Librarian, Faculty, instructional designer, Staff

Level: All

• Saskia Kusnecov is a Research and Instruction Librarian for Babson College, where she is a co-leader for the library’s OER Initiative. Her experience in OER began in New Jersey at Fairleigh Dickinson University, where she helped build up the OER program in response to the state’s Open Textbook Mandate. You can contact her at skusnecov@babson.edu.
• Billy Tringali is a Research and Instruction Librarian for Babson College, where he is a co-leader for the library’s OER Initiative. His experience with OER began in 2018, when he began work on building the Journal of Anime and Manga Studies, an interdisciplinary, peer-reviewed, open access journal currently working on its third volume. You can contact him at wtringali@babson.edu.

Getting Students Involved in OER Creation & Adaptation

Presenters: Steel Wagstaff, Pressbooks; Tineke D’Haeseleer, Muhlenberg College; and Terry Greene, Sir Sandford Fleming College of Applied Arts and Technology

The session will touch on three subtopics: (1) Open-enabled pedagogy & ‘Renewable’ Assignments: Why Get Students Involved, (2) From Introductions to Review: How to Get Students Involved, and (3) Collaboration & Social Learning: What Involvement Looks Like. Anyone who is interested in creating or adapting OER with students should feel encouraged to attend.

Co-presenters will share recent experiences of their own with creating student-led OER. We will pose a series of questions to participants and ask for responses in the Zoom chat. We’ll read selected responses aloud and use these as the basis for further discussion in the roundtable.

Audience: Faculty, Librarian, instructional designer, Staff

Level: All

• Steel Wagstaff is the Educational Product Manager at Pressbooks, where he focuses on developing the Pressbooks authoring & editing platform for use by open education practitioners. Steel has a Ph.D. in English Literature and a master’s degree in Library and Information Studies from the University of Wisconsin and previously worked as an English instructor, writing program administrator, and educational technology consultant. He helped design the Open Pedagogy Notebook website (https://openpedagogy.org/) with Rajiv Jhangiani and Robin DeRosa.
• Tineke D’Haeseleer is an Assistant Professor of History at Muhlenberg College in Allentown, Pennsylvania. She is a historian of premodern China, with a particular interest in medieval China’s foreign relations and teaches courses covering modern and premodern China, Japan and Korea. In recent years, she has led several of her courses in creating innovative open pedagogy projects, including a material culture of China project built by learners with Domain of One’s Own (https://hst137.tdh.bergbuilds.domains/projectfall20/) and China’s Magical Creatures (https://open.muhlenberg.pub/chinasmagicalcreatures/front-matter/introduction/), a student-authored open text published with Pressbooks.
• Terry Greene is a Senior eLearning Designer at Trent University in Ontario, Canada. He is enthusiastic about open, networked, and connected online learning, especially those uses that increase the human element in technology-enabled learning. He has been involved the creation of several prominent student-centered or student-led open education projects, including Gettin’ Air, an open education podcast (https://voiced.ca/project/gettin-air/), Liberated Learners (https://ecampusontario.pressbooks.pub/learner/), and the Open Patchbooks for faculty and learners (https://openfacultypatchbook.org/ + https://openlearnerpatchbook.org/)

OP + OER = IDEA

Presenters: Hamish F. Lutris, Capital Community College; Sandra Flores-Gonzales, Eastern Connecticut State University; and Nicolas Simon, Eastern Connecticut State University

Equity is, in the end, something often levied from above in the form of legislation or organizational policy. This idea of equity from the top down is well-intentioned; however, without participation from those who must use and be assessed by course materials, the drive toward equity is flawed and must remain an unfulfilled dream.

How do we ensure that while promoting equity through our curricula and educational goals, we incorporate the voices and experiences of the often-overlooked populations we teach? Open Educational Resources (OER) and Open Pedagogy (OP) are ways of making certain that equity is not only a priority in our curricular and assessment planning, but also a reality. The three hosts of this roundtable have extensive research experience with OER/OP in Connecticut higher education, as well as being on the cutting edge of its practical application. This dynamic and fast-paced workshop will focus on creating classes rich in the culture of OER/OP to promote inclusion, diversity, equity, and accessibility. Content applicable to both community college and university level study will be explored and discussed. Participants will gain both examples of current best practices and in-class methods that every instructor can use in their classes to ensure that their educational goals are demonstrably achieved while respecting and incorporating students’ voices in a very real, very fundamental, very practical, and very cost-effective way.

Audience: Faculty, Librarian, instructional designer, Administrator, Staff, Other

Level: Intermediate

• Hamish Lutris is an Associate Professor of History, Political Science, and Geography at Capital Community College in Hartford, Connecticut. He has wide-ranging educational interests that include the use of nature in higher educational settings, accessibility to education for disadvantaged populations, and public education through community/college cooperative programs.
• Sandra Flores-Gonzalez advocates for accessible learning focusing on digital accessibility in the Office of AccessAbility at Eastern Connecticut State University. She brings extensive primary, secondary, and higher education experience as a Special Educator and Instructional Specialist with a focus on improving curriculum methods and systems to include all students.
• Dr. Nicolas Simon is a widely-acknowledged leader in OER/OP efforts in Connecticut. He is a member of the Department of Sociology, Anthropology, and Criminology and Social Work at Eastern Connecticut State University, where he has consistently striven to widen the circle of accessibility for students in his classes.

The New OER Frontier: Open Access Publishing

Presenters: Danielle R. Leek, J Sargeant Reynolds Community College and Lance Eaton, College Unbound

This roundtable is designed for writers who are interested in discussion why open access moves the Open Education movement forward, and strategies to secure open access for their own work when engaging with publishers.

The session sparks conversations with three scenarios – each captures a set of conditions that highlight the challenges of moving from traditional copyright and publishing agreements to the open access licenses needed to take our community beyond OER into open access.

The roundtable will produce shared approaches to effectively advocate and advance publishing research and other materials that may serve as OER as well as their own work within a discipline. The roundtable is designed to build our connections with OER and encourage publishers to publish with open access.

Audience: Faculty, Librarian

Level: Intermediate, Advanced

• Danielle Leek, PhD, is the Dean of Online Learning & Instructional Excellence at Reynolds Community College and an instructor at Johns Hopkins University. Her research focuses on the connections between civic engagement, digital equity and the student experience in college classrooms. You can find her on Twitter @drwieseleek.
• Lance Eaton is the Director of Digital Pedagogy at College Unbound, a part-time instructor at North Shore Community College and Southern New Hampshire University, and a PhD student at the University of Massachusetts, Boston with a dissertation that is focusing on how scholars engage in academic piracy. His musings, reflections, and ramblings can be found on his blog: http://www.ByAnyOtherNerd.com as well as on Twitter: @leaton01.

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Workshops

Making Digital Open Educational Resources Accessible to All Learners: A Workshop on Best Practices

Presenters: Sandra Flores-Gonzales, Eastern Connecticut State University; Kevin Corcoran, Connecticut State Colleges and Universities; Tyler S. Fairbanks, Eastern Connecticut State University; Nelly Gonzales, Eastern Connecticut State University; Brooks K. Scavone, Eastern Connecticut State University; Caroline Sechrist, Eastern Connecticut State University; Nicolas P. Simon, Eastern Connecticut State University; Kiyana-Nicole Smith, Eastern Connecticut State University; Maya Vanderberg, Eastern Connecticut State University; and Isabella Cruz, Eastern Connecticut State University

“Open Educational Resources are often framed as supporting equity initiatives. The cost removal aspects of OER are documented expansively. Efforts within Open Pedagogy provide equity of voice and perspective, but equity of ability is often neglected.

With OER being born digitally, it is imperative that, in this digital form, OER be made accessible. In our workshop, we will explore the landscape of higher education for students with disabilities and present the importance of accessibility on student success. This hands-on workshop will provide attendees the ability to review and repair a content document containing common accessibility barriers.

In addition, attendees will learn about an innovative training program where students learn about accessibility best practices and apply those concepts directly to their Open Pedagogy work. the program was developed as a result of student interest. Some of those students will be present to support attendees work with accessibility repair as well as share their perspectives.”

Audience: Faculty, Librarian, instructional designer, Administrator, Staff, Other

Level: Beginner

SUNY Exploring Emerging Technologies for Lifelong Learning & Success (#EmTechMOOC): a Globally Accessible OER Resource

Presenters: Nicole Simon, Robin Sullivan, Dr. Christine Marchese, and Cherie van Putten

Participants will test drive the State University of New York’s “Exploring Emerging Technologies for Lifelong Learning and Success.” This Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) is an open-access resource targeted toward a diverse group of learners, including students, faculty, and anyone from across the globe with an interest to learn how to use freely available established and emerging technologies to succeed in today’s rapidly changing environment.

Learners in this MOOC gain an understanding of the value and implications of using technology tools for career and personal advancement in a framework of lifelong learning strategies and the 4Cs of 21st-century skills: communication, collaboration, creativity, and critical thinking. The modules feature Discovery Learning Exercises for hands-on learning about a variety of available technology tools and resources. The final module involves a peer-review activity of the ePortfolio that participants develop that highlights the artifacts created in the first four modules. The MOOC’s complementary EmTechWIKI is a socially curated collection of technology tools and resources that is also available as a stand-alone open educational resource.

This session begins with an introduction about #EmTechMOOC followed by hands-on experimentation and play in the actual MOOC. Participants build a personal toolbox and learn about web-based technology tools and explore the continued use of the MOOC in their own lives for personal and professional growth.

Visit the project website to learn more: http://suny.edu/emtech

Audience: Faculty, Librarian, instructional designer, Administrator, Staff, Other

Level: Beginner, Intermediate

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Presentations

Write Once, Read Anywhere, Publishing with PreTeXt

Presenter: Kenneth M. Levasseur, University of Massachusetts Lowell

After reviewing the PDF, print, and HTML versions of my text, Applied Discrete Structures, I will step through the process of creating these versions from a single source file using a very small but representative version of the 600+ page text and PreTeXt. Time permitting, I will discuss other conversions of the same source, including Jupyter Notebooks and Braille.

Audience: Faculty, instructional designer

Level: Intermediate

• Kenneth Levasseur is a Professor in the Department of Mathematical Sciences at the University of Massachusetts Lowell. His interests are in discrete mathematics, applied abstract algebra and problem solving.

Visualizing Lectures

Presenter: Kurt Stuke, New England College

In this session, I will address how use the Visme tool to create OERs as infographics. I will provide a process list detailing how to move from a traditional lecture format to a visualized lecture. I will explain the functionality of the platform and share multiple examples from my portfolio. Attendees will be polled to share observations concerning the individual infographics. Alternative tools and methods to Visme will also be explored.

Audience: Faculty, instructional designer

Level: Beginner

• I design and I deliver. I have a passion for engaging learners and for leveraging technology, I am fluent in multiple authoring tools and LMSs and have ample experience in on-campus/on-site and on-line settings.

Understanding Student Experiences of Renewable and Traditional Assignments

Presenters: Lindsey Gumb, Roger Williams University and Virginia Clinton-Lisell, University of North Dakota

In the spring of 2021, 8 faculty members from the Northeast region of the United States participated in professional development in open pedagogy through a community of practice setting facilitated by the New England Board of Higher Education’s Fellow for Open Education, through Lindsey Gumb, also a Roger Williams University faculty member and librarian. Specifically, these faculty learned how to support and engage students in the design and completion of “renewable assignments.” Assignments are renewable in that they have value outside of the classroom and can be openly shared through the application of Creative Commons licenses. We surveyed students who were enrolled in the classes taught by these faculty members on their motivation for assignments and social justice issues. Students reported substantially higher interest, choice, pride, and relatedness with peers for renewable compared to traditional assignments. Importantly, students reported higher levels of representational justice, in which voice and agency are equitable, with renewable assignments. Students who publicly shared reported lower levels of pressure and higher levels of competence than students who chose not to share. Across students, there were high levels of reported understanding of Creative Commons licensing, privacy issues, and the value of sharing, indicating that students were well informed about the unique nature of their renewable assignments. Students also reported that the materials in their courses with renewable overall had higher levels of recognitive justice, in which diversity is acknowledged and respected, then materials in their other courses.

Audience: Faculty, Librarian, instructional designer, Administrator, Staff, Other

Level: All

• Lindsey Gumb is an Associate Professor and Scholarly Communications Librarian at Roger Williams University in Bristol, Rhode Island, and she also serves as the Open Education Fellow at the New England Board of Higher Education in Boston, Massachusetts. With an active interest in the intersections of information literacy, open education, and critical librarianship, Lindsey works with faculty on her campus and region-wide to push the awareness of open education from a cost-savings tool to be more inclusive of pedagogies that allow for opportunities to create systemic changes in more representative and equitable information creation, evaluation, and access. She resides in Rhode Island with her family and together they enjoy the beach, hiking, gardening, and their animals.
• Virginia Clinton-Lisell, PhD, is an Associate Professor in Educational Foundations and Research at the University of North Dakota and serves as a Primary Researcher for the Open Education Group. Dr. Clinton-Lisell’s research centers on reading comprehension and open education. She is currently developing online reading comprehension assessments for students at various grade levels. In addition, she examines differences in reading paper and screens with the goal of improving digital reading through interactivity and personalization. Her work in open education focuses on how to empower teachers and students through accessible and flexible open educational resources.

Writing and Using an OER textbook

Presenter: Helmut G. Loeffler, CUNY Queensborough Community College

I have written a textbook for an introductory class in History at the Community College level. The textbook was made available to the public as an Open Educational Resource on CUNY Academic Works. It has been downloaded all around the world (146 countries) about 12500 times. Because of this widespread usage and feedback from students I have decided to write another textbook which covers Ancient Greek History. The project has been supported by an OER grant. I am in the process of writing this book (approximately 90 pages completed so far).

I would like to discuss the unexpected challenges and problems in creating the textbooks as Open Educational Resources from an individual point of view. By highlighting both the problems and the successes, hopefully more faculty can be encouraged to switch to the use of open textbooks.

I will also cover the effects of usage of the OER on my students, emphasizing the individual needs to make them better.

The switch to online teaching during the pandemic has especially emphasized the necessity for affordable textbooks because many of our students were hit hard economically. The pandemic has also shown that online teaching is now a part of education in the future which further increases demands for online resources that are easily accessible.

Audience: Faculty

Level: Intermediate

• Dr. Helmut G. Loeffler Associate Professor Dept. of History CUNY-Queensborough Community College. Education: Ludwig Maximilians University Munich, Greek Philology, Dr. phil. Feb. 12th 2007 (magna cum laude) Ludwig Maximilians University Munich, M.A. in Greek and Latin Philology July 2003. Teaching and Research Interest: Greek Historiography, Greek Tragedy, History of Classical Scholarship, Ancient History.

Go Open CT: Platform and Pedagogy for OER

Presenters: Douglas Casey, State of Connecticut and Kevin Corcoran, Connecticut State Colleges and Universities

This session will provide participants with updates from Connecticut on the coordinated efforts to enable and expand the use of OER in schools and universities. This novel approach seeks to empower these two constituencies with OER tools, funding, and supports and to encourage collaboration across K – 12 and higher education.

Kevin Corcoran will update attendees on the state’s OER Coordinating Council grant program, with progress to date and lessons learned that will inform the work of colleagues running similar programs in other states. Doug Casey will tie this OER collaboration, creation, and curation work to the launch this year of the State’s OER repository, Go Open CT (www.GoOpenCT.org).

Participants will gain valuable takeaways on how state leaders garnered the funding and support for the portal, how the site supports both school and university OER development, and plans for expansion for the coming months and years. Doug will also tie the work in Connecticut to broader efforts among the national #GoOpen network (www.GoOpen.us), where he serves as a member of the Steering Committee.

Audience: Faculty, Librarian, Administrator, Staff, Other

Level: Beginner, Intermediate

• Doug Casey is the Executive Director for the CT State Commission for Educational Technology, where he designs and manages strategic plans that ensure the successful integration of technology in Connecticut’s schools, libraries, universities, and towns. The Commission oversees statewide programs such as its flagship research and education broadband network, the CEN. He also sits on numerous national leadership boards and serves as the current Board Chair for the State Educational Technology Directors Association.
• Kevin Corcoran is the Associate Vice-President of Digital Learning for the Connecticut State Colleges & Universities System. Kevin is responsible for the development and support of system-wide strategies for the effective use of digital learning tools and content that focuses on quality standards and practices, student engagement, accessibility and affordability. He currently chairs both the statewide Connecticut OER Coordinating Council and the systemwide CSCU OER Council. Kevin was also a founding member of the Northeast OER Summit.

Interdisciplinary OER Development: Virtual Microscope

Presenters: Dorothy Salinas, County College of Morris; Caitlin Burns, County College of Morris; and Eric Guadara, County College of Morris

The session will introduce the creation of a custom, virtual microscope that serves as an Open Educational Resource (OER) for college-level biology courses. The virtual microscope was developed as an interdisciplinary collaboration between faculty members of the Biology and Chemistry Department and Information Technologies Department at County College of Morris (CCM), Randolph, NJ. It is a product of the Open Textbook Collaborative (OTC), a New Jersey Higher Education program, funded by the U.S. Department of Education. The virtual microscope is an open source, functional, easy-to-use interface integrated into the project’s OpenNJ OTC repository. It contains slides that reflect the curriculum needs of several biology courses at CCM. It seamlessly supports course learning objectives (i.e., Use appropriate laboratory tools and techniques to examine anatomical structures or physiological functions) and may replace the need for students to purchase a microscope as part of a required laboratory kit in online courses. The Virtual Microscope allows online students to practice and hone microscopy skills that they otherwise would not have the opportunity to access as online learners. All students, regardless of modality, will have the ability to view specimens relevant to course content and practice microscopy skills outside of the classroom. This makes the virtual microscope an important study tool for student success. Additionally, as two of the goals of the sponsoring grant are to disseminate and sustain an OER ecosystem across NJ and surrounding states, we will discuss the additional planning and programming needed to incorporate the virtual microscope into OpenNJ.

Audience: Faculty, Librarian, instructional designer, Administrator

Level: Intermediate

• Dorothy Salinas is an Assistant Professor of Biology in the Biology and Chemistry Department at County College of Morris (CCM), Randolph, NJ. The primary courses she instructs are Concepts in Biology (BIO 132) and Biology of Environmental Concerns (BIO 127) and she serves as the co-advisor of the CCM Environmental Club. Salinas has obtained a B.S. in Biology from The College of New Jersey, M.S. in Biology from the University of Nebraska at Kearney and is currently enrolled in an Ed.D. in Educational Sustainability program at the University of Wisconsin at Stevens Point. In addition to the Open Educational Resource (OER) Virtual Microscope, Salinas has developed a low-cost, online option for non-major students to satisfy their 4-credit general education science requirement. Cost was limited by the implementation of an OER textbook and the elimination of a required laboratory kit. Students complete hands-on laboratories, at home, utilizing common household items.
• Caitlin Burns is the Chairperson of the Biology and Chemistry Department and an Assistant Professor of Biology at County College of Morris (CCM), Randolph, NJ. Burns holds a B.S. in Biological Sciences from Rowan University and a M.S. in Molecular Biology from Montclair State University. The primary courses she instructs are Anatomy and Physiology I and II (BIO 101, BIO 102). Burns has taught courses in face-to-face, hybrid, and online course modalities. She continually investigates ways to increase student success in anatomy and physiology courses.
• Eric Guadara makes games. He also makes seltzer, pickles, music, shoe racks, and more. He rides his road bike when he can. He studied Poetry and Film at Rutgers, Teaching at Seton Hall, and Game Design at LIU Post. He currently teaches all of the Game Design courses at County College of Morris in New Jersey and is happy to be a part of the OER Microscope team. When he’s not in front of >= 1 screen, he’s spending time with his family and friends, preferably in the sun.

Inclusive or Exclusive? Reexamining “Inclusive Access” Textbook Programs

Presenter: Trudi C. Radtke, Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition (SPARC)

In an effort to make course materials more affordable and accessible, many campuses are experimenting with “Inclusive Access” programs. Designed by the textbook industry, Inclusive Access is an emerging sales model that adds the cost of digital course content into students’ tuition and fees—in other words, automatic textbook billing. While the advertised benefits of these programs have been widely promoted, there are also drawbacks for students and faculty that deserve equal attention. This presentation will provide the facts on what Inclusive Access programs mean for your campus, explore how they differ from open models like OER, and examine whether Inclusive Access is “inclusive” at all. Also learn how to access resources and more information from InclusiveAccess.org. All campus personnel are welcome and audience engagement is encouraged as the point of this session is to equip campus decision makers; there will be time during and at the end of the presentation for Q&A.

Audience: Faculty, Librarian, instructional designer, Administrator, Staff

Level: Beginner

• Trudi Radtke is an open education project manager for SPARC (Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition). In this role they spearhead advocacy and implementation for initiatives to make education more open and equitable. Their portfolio includes InclusiveAccess.org, an initiative to raise awareness about the challenges of automatic textbook billing. Trudi also contributes across SPARC’s open education policy and advocacy efforts. Prior to working at SPARC Trudi was an Education Technology Specialist, OER Specialist and open consultant in the CA community college system. As an OER specialist and consultant, they have assisted in the creation of over 120 open textbooks and several Z-Degree pathways. Trudi is passionate about open and has advocated for OER at the state, regional, and international levels.

Sustaining the Open Textbook Collaborative: Leveraging Partnerships and Relationships Statewide

Presenters: Steve Chudnick, Middlesex County College; Marilyn N. Ochoa, Middlesex College; and Robert Hilliker, Rowan University

Led by Middlesex College, NJ statewide partners were awarded $1.44 mil by the U.S. Department of Education OTP program for the Open Textbook Collaborative (OTC). This consortium, consisting of New Jersey’s community colleges and Rowan University with support from Rutgers University and New Jersey Institute of Technology, is in its second year of a project to create, disseminate, sustain, and incorporate open educational resources (OER) in high-cost STEM career and technical education programs. Partnering with the NJ Council of Community Colleges, we consciously aligned our goals with their New Jersey Pathways to Career Opportunities (NJCCC) initiative which will contribute to the post-secondary ecosystem providing on-ramps to career pathways in high growth occupations over the next 10 years. Focusing on four growth industries, we work with NJCCC to find collaborators across secondary and higher education, community and faith-based organizations, state and local governments, and business and industry. Moving forward together, our initiatives can remove economic and other educational barriers keeping many in minority and other underserved communities from accessing these high-growth, high-paying careers. This session will cover our approaches to creating an infrastructure to support the OTC, including resource allocation, knowledge building, and organizing to build a collaborative state-wide entity in a state without the centralized Higher Education System enjoyed by many of our peers. We welcome a discussion with members of other statewide OER projects to exchange ideas and find ways to continually improve our processes in such areas as recruitment, division of labor, infrastructure building, educational technology, and sustainability.

OERTX: Integrating Research with Statewide Programmatic Strategies

Presenters: Melinda N. Boland, ISKME and Amee E. Godwin, ISKME

Critical to supporting state-wide OER growth across institutions of higher education is understanding the current landscape of OER in those institutions and changes to that landscape over time. The Institute for the Study of Knowledge Management and Education (ISKME), DigiTex, and the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board (THECB) collaborated in biannual landscape surveys of OER in higher education institutions in Texas in 2019 and 2021. These surveys assessed what kinds of programming and policies are in place to support OER, obstacles to OER implementation, availability of OER courses, and the role of students, faculty, and internal and external partnerships in OER implementation. In this session, we will share the results of this longitudinal analysis, particularly highlighting the practices of institutions that have had high levels of success at OER capacity building. We will also discuss how this research was used to inform and support OER policy at the state level and how that is demonstrated in the decisions made by THECB. We’ll look at the OERTX digital library, explore the accomplishments thus far, and look at continued plans for building institutional engagement around the value of OER. We will then invite participants to reflect in break-out rooms on how the Texas findings might inform OER implementation and capacity building at their own institutions within their regions, state, or national ecosystems.

Audience: Administrator, Librarian, Staff, Other

Level: Intermediate

• Melinda Boland brings over 20 years of experience in educational technology, product development, and editorial work to ISKME and OER Commons. At ISKME, Melinda runs the services group, which includes platform and tools development, field building in open education, and library services. Each team in the services group strives to further ISKME’s purpose of building participatory, equitable access to education. Prior to joining ISKME in 2014, Melinda worked at Stanford Libraries developing an eBook platform for scholarly communications and Cengage Learning developing eLearning products to support the life sciences.
• Amee Evans Godwin oversees ISKME’s research and development, administers grant-based programs, and contributes to national open education network and community facilitation. She brings more than two decades of experience in applied research and interactive applications focused on learning and collaboration. Prior to joining ISKME, Amee worked as a consultant at Interval Research and in strategic market research at high-tech firms and nonprofits in San Francisco and Silicon Valley. She holds a Master’s Degree from New York University Tisch School of the Arts in Interactive Telecommunications, and B.A. from University of Buffalo’s Center for Media Study.

The Do Better Challenge Open Grant Program: A Way to Sustain and Evaluate OER Improvements

Presenter: Jamison Miller, Lumen Learning and Royce Kimmons, Brigham Young University

In this session, we will share a novel approach to sustaining and evaluating improvements to OER. Lumen Learning’s Do Better Challenge grant program invites anyone and everyone to engage in the continuous improvement of open educational resources. We are looking to leverage the power of community and collaboration by financially supporting efforts to make changes to existing OER, evaluate them for effectiveness, and share improvements with students everywhere.

We call for succinct (250-500 word) proposals for changes to OER content associated with a list of Lumen-identified learning outcomes that students across the country struggle with. Proposals need to specify how applicants will apply instructional design principles, peer-reviewed research, accessibility standards, and perspectives of diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging. We share our rubric for evaluating proposals with applicants to help guide their work.

Applicants with top proposals are awarded small grants ($250) to revise / remix / create new learning activities. Lumen’s course design team then conducts quality assurance and implements the changes within our randomized controlled trial (RCT) framework. If the RCT demonstrates that the updated learning activities significantly improve student learning, grantees receive a 10x cash bonus of the amount of the original grant ($2,500).”

Audience: Faculty, Librarian, instructional designer, Administrator, Staff, Other

Level: All

• Jamison Miller is the Director, Research Communication at Lumen Learning.

“But Where is the Courseware?” Finding, Creating, and Using Ancillary OER Materials

Presenter: Mandi Goodsett, Cleveland State University

As more faculty become aware of the benefits of open educational resources and other affordable course material, many are confronted with the problem of losing access to ancillary content like test banks, homework assignments, and PowerPoint slides, which they have come to rely on from commercial publishers. For some faculty, this barrier is insurmountable, compelling them to continue using expensive commercial textbooks, even if they believe in the cause of open education. Publishers, vendors, and faculty have been slowly addressing the ancillary material problem by developing low-cost, free, and/or openly-licensed ancillary options. However, it can be very difficult to find these materials to use or suggest to faculty.

In this session, I will provide an overview of the existing platforms and producers of ancillary materials, as well as tips for trying to find this material. I’ll also give an overview of how faculty can be actively involved in creating new ancillary material for existing open textbooks, drawing both from examples at other institutions and several successful projects at my own institution.

Audience: Librarian, Faculty, instructional designer, Staff

Level: Intermediate, Advanced

• Mandi Goodsett is the Performing Arts and Humanities Librarian as well as the OER and Copyright Advisor at Cleveland State University in Ohio. She serves as an OhioLINK Affordable Learning Ambassador and an instructor for the Open Education Network Certificate in OER Librarianship Certification. She is also co-coordinates the library’s Textbook Affordability Grant to promote the adoption of open textbooks. Her research interests include open education, information literacy, and critical thinking in library instruction.

Using Librarian and Faculty Personas to Design OER Discovery Solutions

Presenters: Michelle Brennan, Institute for the Study of Knowledge Management in Education and Selena Burns, Institute for the Study of Knowledge Management in Education

To achieve widespread adoption of OER in higher education, faculty must be able to easily find OER that aligns with their needs. The Institute for the Study of Knowledge Management in Education (ISKME) created and maintains the OER Commons, a digital library of open educational resources, as well as custom hubs and microsites for sharing and discovering OER. In an effort to better understand the challenges encountered by higher education faculty and librarians when searching for and selecting OER to use in the classroom, ISKME conducted a series of in depth think-aloud interviews with users across the U.S. From these interviews, five distinct types of librarian and faculty users emerged. In this session, we will go over these 5 user personas, and share how those personas and the research that informed them is guiding current work to create search experiences and metadata application practices that are more useful to faculty members. Session participants will be polled to see which (if any) of the personas they identify with and where additional research may be helpful, give feedback on some of the tools that were created in response to this research, and give input on other ways these personas might be leveraged to improve OER initiatives more broadly.

Audience: Faculty, Librarian, instructional designer, Administrator, Staff, Other

Level: Intermediate

• Michelle Brennan leads overall product development for ISKME’s Open Access Digital Library Platforms. Collaborating across research, UX, engineering, and customer service teams, she works to define and deliver features and services that bring value to our partners and further the vision of equitable and open access to high quality educational materials. Michelle received her Masters in Information Science from the University of Michigan School of Information where she worked as an Instructional Technology Support Librarian. She is passionate about the role of open knowledge tools in education because improving opportunities for participation in collaborative spaces is an important part of empowering individuals and communities.
• Selena Burns is a Senior Research Associate for the Institute for the Study of Knowledge Management in Education (ISKME) where she develops, manages, and implements research grants and applied research projects related to OER. Prior to her time at ISKME, she worked on NSF and IES funded science education research and evaluation projects in partnership with Bay Area higher education institutions and non-profits. She has a PhD in Educational Theatre from New York University and a Masters in Communication from Stanford. Selena has a particular interest in research that supports equitable and inclusive education and the elevation of diverse voices in the curriculum.

Start Creating OER with Interactive Choice Boards

Presenter: Susan Eliason, Bridgewater State University

If you want to create OER to customize your course content, start small. In this session, you can explore using Choice Boards for presenting course content. Since 2015, the presenter creates OER and will share her experience; realizing that moving from adapting OER to creating OER is a journey started with small steps. Choice boards can provide the bridge from adapting to creating. Why choice boards? Choice is a key component of learner-centered teaching. Providing choice enhances learning by increasing engagement, motivation, and can support communication and collaboration. Choice boards support the Universal Design for Learning. In the session, you will explore the benefits of using choice boards to promote interactive integrative learning through an example from an interdisciplinary course. Next attendees will see a demonstration of how to create a choice board. Then attendees will be encouraged to practice using a choice board with a Google document.

Audience: Faculty, instructional designer, Librarian

Level: Intermediate, Advanced

• Dr. Susan Eliason is an Associate Professor in Early Childhood Education and Childhood Studies. She has created OER since 2015, started with iBooks, and then moved to Pressbooks in 2018. All courses taught by her are supported by the Pressbooks she created. Since 2016, Susan is a member of the OER committee at Bridgewater State University. She designed and co-facilitated an OER Bootcamp at BSU in 2021. She has presented: 1. Increase Affordability and Accessibility of your College Course with Open Educational Resources (OER) poster session for National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC) Annual Conference, November 2018, Washington, DC 2. Upcycling Learning with Open Pedagogy at the OpenEd18 Conference, October 2018, Niagara Falls, NY. 3. Creating a Video Explanation to Improve Teaching and Learning at the Lilly Conferences on College and University Teaching and Learning in May 2015.

Developing Online Open Lab Manuals for STEM Classes

Presenter: Andria Schwortz, Quinsigamond Community College

This presentation will take participants through the process of identifying the most important topics for inclusion in online/at-home labs, identifying online simulations and other online resources, considering materials students can find at home, and an example of how to share final products. Following the research-based methods of STEM teacher professional development workshops, participants will have time to discuss in small groups how to bring the ideas of this session into their own classrooms, and what they see as challenges they may face in the process.

The presenter will share resources including highly regarded websites for simulation-based labs in physics and astronomy, and the physics and astronomy labs the presenter created for use during the COVID pandemic remote instruction. Participants will be given a Google Drive link to share the material they create with each other after the conference.

Audience: Faculty, instructional designer

Level: Beginner

• Andria Schwortz is a recent PhD graduate in Physics from the University of Wyoming, studying issues in equity and empowerment in post-secondary physics and astronomy students, and STEM teacher professional development. Andria is also a tenured Full Professor of Physics at Quinsigamond Community College in Worcester, MA, with an interest in online education, and reducing costs for students of physics and astronomy.

Doctoral Students and the Future of OER: Understanding Their Needs, Usage, and Perspectives

Presenters: Bryan McGeary, The Pennsylvania State University; Mihoko Hosoi, The Pennsylvania State University; and Lana Munip, The Pennsylvania State University

While discussions of open textbook needs and perceptions have typically focused on undergraduate students and faculty, graduate students face some unique challenges related to course materials. Their positionality as students and also potentially future faculty, researchers, or instructors can provide useful insight as academic libraries seek opportunities to promote open textbooks. This presentation reports on the results of semi-structured in-depth interviews with 12 doctoral students in the College of Education at Penn State University. The students discussed their textbook needs and usage habits, the impact of required textbooks on their course selection and perceptions of faculty, as well as their reflections on future directions for textbooks. Their comments point to a need for improved library provision of access to course materials and an increasing consultative role in which libraries provide expertise and resources that support an infrastructure for future educators to develop, publish, and curate OER. The findings of this study point to some suggestions for faculty in their work with doctoral students and for libraries in their support of students and faculty. Attendees will have opportunities to share their input through real-time polling and chat.

Audience: Faculty, Librarian, Administrator

Level: Intermediate

• Bryan McGeary is the Learning Design and Open Education Engagement Librarian at Penn State University. He is a SPARC Open Education Leadership Fellow, a member of Affordable Learning Pennsylvania’s steering committee, a graduate of the Open Education Network’s Certificate in OER Librarianship, and co-editor of the peer-reviewed open access journal Pennsylvania Libraries: Research & Practice. His research interests include open pedagogy, the intersections of librarianship and popular culture, and the relationship between place branding and regional identity. He has served in elected and appointed capacities in the American Library Association, the Association of College & Research Libraries, and the Pennsylvania Library Association. He earned a PhD in American Culture Studies and a graduate certificate in Public History from Bowling Green State University, an MLIS from the University of Pittsburgh, and an MS in Journalism from Ohio University.
• Mihoko Hosoi is the Associate Dean for Collections Research and Scholarly Communications at Penn State University. Mihoko Hosoi holds a master’s degree in library and information science from University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
• Lana Munip is an Analysis and Planning Consultant at Penn State University. She holds a master’s degree in Higher Education from the Pennsylvania State University.

DIY IDEAs for OER: The Best Kind of Acronym Salad

Presenter: Sybil Priebe, North Dakota State College of Science

Like many educators, I latched onto the idea of OER because of the freedom and flexibility it would give me to cover what I wanted in my courses and avoid teaching an expensive textbook by a publishing company that would change content every other year. What I didn’t realize was the social justice aspect of OER.

Most educators know the IDEA principles when they see them (audio, captions, non-white authors), but how do we take any OER we’re working on, or any OER we find in a random repository, incorporate IDEA principles? We can accept the IDEA principles and theories, but what does that theory look like in action? What are the actual steps and tools? In this presentation, I’ll show a play-by-play of how I added in elements of IDEA principles

Audience: Faculty, Librarian, instructional designer

Level: Advanced

• Sybil Priebe is a college writing teacher in the upper midwest who likes books, bicycles, and blasphemy.

Developing OpenPublishing Within the OpenNJ Open Education Repository

Presenters: Marilyn N. Ochoa, Middlesex College and Mark V. Sullivan, Sobek Digital

This session will cover development of the OpenPublishing platform which integrates into an open open-source, standards-based SobekCM digital repository (OpenNJ) to host open educational resources. This OpenNJ system developed for the open textbook collaborative project and funded by the United States Department of Education Open Textbook Pilot Program included a technology-based strategy for continuous improvement open repository that includes the inauguration of the first national Career and Technical Education (CTE) Course OER Collection. This affordable solution allows for searching for, creating, hosting, and integrating OER (textbooks, quizzes, lectures, and more) into learning management systems (LMS) and other systems in the seamless way. To promote active learning, this solution provides a new opportunity for faculty to create online learning materials which can be incorporated in an LMS while also encouraging sharing of the OER throughout the larger educational community. This personalized learning experience within the system creates opportunities to engage with students as creators of information rather than as only consumers; this is a hallmark of open pedagogy in which faculty and students learn and create knowledge together, which can transform instruction and student improve learning outcomes (Allen et al., 2015).

We will demo the OpenPublishing tool and discuss the overall workflow. The presenters will lead an open discussion with the participants about creation of material and additional needs for OER use, creation, and reuse. Potential OER content users and creators are encouraged to come and bring ideas and their own experiences with them to facilitate the discussion.

Audience: Faculty, Librarian, instructional designer, Administrator, Staff

Level: Beginner, Intermediate

• Marilyn N. Ochoa is the Library Services Director at Middlesex College and the Principal Investigator and Director for the US Department of Education Open Textbook Collaborative FIPSE grant. At Middlesex, Marilyn actively seeks to implement educational technologies to transform library and tutoring services, and leads her areas in digital library development and use of open educational resources. She was previously the Associate Library Director at State University of New York at Oswego and Interim Head of the University of Florida’s Education Library. She serves on the Society for Instructional Technology and Teacher Education Executive Board and was a Director-at-Large on the ACRL Board of Directors from 2012-2014. Her research covers topics including OER, embedded librarianship, digital collections assessment and outreach, and collaborative teaching and learning tools.
• Mark Sullivan is the grant developer working on the Open Textbook Collaborative FIPSE grant. Mark works closely with the principal investigator and project coordinator to ensure the technical requirements of the grant are fulfilled and create and support the OpenPublishing tool for creation and reuse of open education resources. Mark worked for fifteen years at the University of Florida Digital Collections as a software developer and trainer. He currently serves as the chief architect of the open-source SobekCM repository and CIO of Sobek Digital Hosting & Consulting.

QB@CC: An interdisciplinary network model for developing and disseminating OER to support pedagogical change

Presenter: Sarah Prescott and Deborah Rook

The Quantitative Biology at Community Colleges (QB@CC) project has generated a collection of Open Educational Resources (OER) for use in introductory-level life sciences and mathematics courses. These OER are developed by interdisciplinary teams of biology and math faculty from community colleges and specifically target key quantitative skills in biology that are critical to student success in biology (AAAS, 2011). The interdisciplinary teams publish their modules through the QUBESHub platform as OER. Dissemination of these OER is supported by Faculty Mentoring Networks—professional development experiences in which the QB@CC network participants act as peer mentors, demonstrating how to use the OER effectively and encouraging new users to adapt the OER and publish their own versions.

We will present the QB@CC project as a potential model for OER development and discuss future collaborations with faculty. We know OER become most valuable to the community as they proceed through the life cycle of “Find-Adapt-Use-Share,” which aligns with the project goals of dissemination through “find and use,” and adds adapting and resharing with the Faculty Mentoring Networks (FMNs) when FMN participants publish their own adaptations of OERs. These final steps keep OER relevant and timely, as well as more flexible as adaptations for different educational settings are shared. OER are also an important resource in reducing barriers to access, especially as instructors prepare to teach in ways that can move smoothly between in-person and online delivery.

AAAS & NSF. (2011) Vision and Change in Undergraduate Biology Education: A call to action. AAAS, ISBN:978-0-87168-741-8, http://www.visionandchange.org (accessed 3/18/2022)”

Audience: Faculty

Level: Intermediate, Advanced

• Sarah Prescott: I am the President and Executive Director of BioQUEST Curriculum Consortium and an Associate Professor of Biochemistry at the University of New Hampshire. I am the PI of the NSF RCN-UBE-funded project “Quantitative Biology and Community Colleges”, where I facilitate interdisciplinary groups of faculty who are designing and implementing new OER for STEM classrooms. As an educator for more than 15 years, I use open-access materials in all my courses and have been an ambassador on my campus for the creation and use of OER.
• Deb Rook: I am the Deputy Director of BioQUEST and have been working in professional development with this organization for almost 5 years. My background is in paleontology and evolutionary biology, though education and outreach have always been my passion. I have been part of the QB@CC project for several years and have assisted in the creation and facilitation of interdisciplinary groups to produce and implement new materials in STEM classrooms. BioQUEST now focuses on online networking and community building and through the QUBES platform, I have worked with many partner projects and BioQUEST initiatives to take advantage of this platform and its cyber-social infrastructure. The QUBES platform also features a large Open Education Resource Library that integrates with the communities with which we work.

Open Creation and Pedagogy in Action: Piloting an Open Educational Course in Psychological Research Methods

Presenter: Greg Mullin, Bunker Hill Community College

This presentation will walk attendees through the process of creating an open-ed section of Psychological Research Methods, including textbook selection, the development of resources and activities, and the assessment of student work. Attendees will then be split into small groups to discuss how they could apply open-educational practices to design/revise their own course-related materials and activities.

Audience: Faculty

Level: Intermediate

• Greg Mullin is a Professor of Psychology at Bunker Hill Community College. He received his Ph.D. in Educational Psychology from the University of Connecticut and lives with his wife and four children (ages 10, 7, 5, and 1) in Bolton, MA.

On-going evaluation of OER

Presenter: Kathy DesRoches EdD, Granite State College

In this presentation, I will describe my experiences with OER as the lead faculty at my institution working to develop and curate OER for courses. Since other faculty using OER in their courses do not provide feedback on the materials, I would like to employ a systematic program to objectively evaluate the materials used in the classes. I will share current rubrics to evaluate materials and then use breakout rooms to develop solutions to how often materials should be evaluated and what method should be used for evaluation.

Audience: Faculty, Other, Staff, Librarian

Level: Intermediate

• Kathy DesRoches is the Program Director and faculty member in the Master’s in Leadership and Graduate Certificate in Nonprofit Leadership at Granite State College. She serves as a mentor and advisor to her students. Kathy sits on many committees at the college. Kathy’s interest is in open educational resources. She has collaborated with other faculty to create six books and is collaborating with her students who contribute to these books. Kathy holds a Doctorate in Education from Plymouth State University. Activities outside of work include President and founding member of the nonprofit NHVegFest, chair of the Planning Board in her town, and the vice chair of her local political party. She lives with her husband and two dogs in NH.

Advancing library support of OER with a faculty listening tour: what we learned and how you can do it too

Presenters: Andrea Schuler, Tufts University and Alyn Gamble, Tufts University

The Tisch Library OER Steering Committee was formed in 2020 to strategically identify how to grow support for OER at Tufts University. During the Fall 2021 semester, the committee conducted a faculty listening tour (on the model of Temple University https://doi.org/10.5860/crln.80.6.317). Our goal was to learn more about how our faculty choose course materials and their use and perceptions of OER so that we could better understand needs around course materials and plan future outreach and services.

This presentation will discuss our process of planning and carrying out the listening tour, including IRB submission, recruitment, and other logistics; our findings from the interviews; and short and long-term next steps we’ve identified to advance our support of OER at Tufts.

After the presentation, attendees will be able to plan a listening tour at their own institution using our presented workflow and be able to incorporate & adapt improvements made to supporting OER at Tufts to their own institutional context.

Audience: Faculty, Librarian, Administrator

Level: Beginner, Intermediate

• Andrea Schuler is the Copyright & Open Scholarship Librarian at Tisch Library at Tufts University. She supports the Tufts community in copyright, publishing, author’s rights, and sharing scholarship in order to encourage open access & wide use of scholarship. She is chair of the library’s OER Steering Committee which is working to build support for the use of OER at Tufts to reduce cost burdens to students and to increase the use of open, accessible, and inclusive course materials. Prior to coming to Tufts, she was a visual resources librarian at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Andrea has a BA in history from Boston College and an MLIS from Simmons College.
• Alyn Gamble is the Research Librarian for the Sciences at Tisch Library at Tufts University, a Ph.D. candidate at Simmons University, and an affiliate faculty member at Emerson College. Through their support of academic communities, they have noticed a need for affordable resources, but an unawareness of how this can be done and how these scholars can contribute their own knowledge. Formerly, Alyn has worked as a research associate at Harvard University and a science librarian at New College of Florida and Mote Marine Laboratory. They hold an MLIS from Louisiana State University, an MLA from Tulane University, and a BA from Spring Hill College.

Developing an OER Assessment Guide for your Institution, Consortium or State Governing Body

Presenters: Connie Strittmatter, Fitchburg State University and Jacalyn Kremer, Fitchburg State University

This session is geared towards individuals with intermediate and advanced experience in OER who are interested in developing key performance indicators to measure the level of success in a state-wide, consortial, or institutional OER program.

In this session the presenters will provide an overview of the process they used to develop a key performance indicator (KPI) guide for Massachusetts community colleges, universities, and UMass system. The guide provided guidance on how to calculate several key performance indicators which will be reported to the Massachusetts Department of Higher Education.

The process included working collaboratively with a small group to develop the format for the guide. Several iterations of the guide were presented to the MA OER Advisory Council to solicit feedback and buy-in for the data collection process and was officially endorsed in April 2022.

Users will leave with some strategies on how to establish consensus when creating a document to be used by diverse institutions and a template on how to develop their own KPI implementation guide for their institution, consortium, or state board of higher education.

Massachusetts Department of Higher Education OER Assessment KPIs Implementation Guide online @ https://bit.ly/3wXLcsN

Audience: Administrator, Staff, Other, Librarian

Level: Intermediate, Advanced

• Connie Strittmatter is the Strategic Projects Librarian at Fitchburg State University. She supports the university’s open and affordable education initiative by delivering workshops on OER topics and working individually with faculty to incorporate OER into their courses. In addition to her work in Open Education, Connie’s research interests include developing models of instruction for academic integrity and exploring students’ sense of belonging in academic libraries and on college campuses.
• Jacalyn Kremer is the Dean of the Library at Fitchburg State University. She is the chair of the Open and Affordable Education Committee at Fitchburg State. She is also on the Massachusetts State OER Advisory Council and on its Steering Committee. She is particularly interested in the development and application of OER key performance metrics for institutions and across consortiums. She has co-facilitated an OER Community of Practice.

Enlarging our Notion of Equity in the Use of Open Educational Resources

Presenter: Nancy O’Neill, University System of Maryland

In this session, the presenter will discuss the limitations of existing notions of equity that frame OER use and propose a broadened framework. This broadened framework derives from the presenter’s dissertation that examined faculty use of OER in relation to the content and teaching affordances made possible by open licensing.

Audience: Faculty, Librarian, instructional designer, Administrator, Staff, Other

Level: All

• Dr. Nancy O’Neill is the Associate Director of the Kirwan Center for Academic Innovation at the University System of Maryland. She coordinates the System’s teaching and learning center directors and supports Kirwan Center initiatives that directly engage faculty and academic leaders, including efforts to scale and sustain open educational resources. Prior to being at USM, she served as the Director of the Center for Excellence in Learning, Teaching, and Technology at the University of Baltimore from 2012 to 2016, and before that, spent a decade at the American Association of Colleges and Universities (AAC&U) as a senior staff member working on national curriculum and assessment projects. She recently earned her doctorate from the University of Pennsylvania. Her dissertation examined faculty use of OER with respect to the content and teaching affordances theoretically made possible by virtue of open licensing.

OER Communication Strategies

Presenter: Hayley Battaglia, Southern Connecticut State University

You’ve created your OER materials or come up with an argument for the importance of supporting OER at your institution, but how do you publicize your work and create buy-in with your community and administrators? Communication plays an essential role in OER initiatives, and you can increase the success of your work in OER by leveraging effective communication strategies. This presentation will discuss how the Connecticut State Colleges and Universities (CSCUs) use the OpenCSCU website and the recently developed OpenCSCU OER Blog to highlight the insights, expertise, and achievements of our colleagues working in OER and to promote opportunities for collaboration and professional development to our community.

I will cover the process of identifying the blog as a suitable means of information sharing, the planning and research stages, and the initial implementation and reception, as well as goals for the future. I will also ask attendees to think about their own institutions or communities and their stakeholders, and what modes of communication would best reach their intended audiences

Audience: Faculty, Librarian, instructional designer, Administrator, Staff, Other

Level: Intermediate

• Hayley Battaglia is the Serials & Electronic Resources Librarian at Hilton C. Buley Library of Southern Connecticut State University. She is a member of the CSCU OER Advisory Council, chair of the OER Committee at Buley Library, a graduate of the Creative Commons Certificate Course and editor of the OpenCSCU OER Blog.

Making Digital Open Educational Resources Accessible to All Learners: A Workshop on Best Practices

Presenters: Sandra Flores-Gonzales, Eastern Connecticut State University; Kevin Corcoran, Connecticut State Colleges and Universities; Tyler S. Fairbanks, Eastern Connecticut State University; Nelly Gonzales, Eastern Connecticut State University; Brooks K. Scavone, Eastern Connecticut State University; Caroline Sechrist, Eastern Connecticut State University; Nicolas P. Simon, Eastern Connecticut State University; Kiyana-Nicole Smith, Eastern Connecticut State University; Maya Vanderberg, Eastern Connecticut State University; and Isabella Cruz, Eastern Connecticut State University

Open Educational Resources are often framed as supporting equity initiatives. The cost removal aspects of OER are documented expansively. Efforts within Open Pedagogy provide equity of voice and perspective, but equity of ability is often neglected.

With OER being born digitally, it is imperative that, in this digital form, OER be made accessible. In our workshop, we will explore the landscape of higher education for students with disabilities and present the importance of accessibility on student success. This hands-on workshop will provide attendees the ability to review and repair a content document containing common accessibility barriers.

In addition, attendees will learn about an innovative training program where students learn about accessibility best practices and apply those concepts directly to their Open Pedagogy work. the program was developed as a result of student interest. Some of those students will be present to support attendees work with accessibility repair as well as share their perspectives.

Audience: Faculty, Librarian, instructional designer, Administrator, Staff, Other

Level: Beginner

Now You See It. Now You Don’t: Lessons Learned about Losing Funding for an OER Initiative

Presenter: Reta Chaffee, Granite State College

In 2011, the University System of NH provided significant funding to support the increased use of technology in teaching and learning. The newly formed Academic Technology Steering Committee, whose membership included faculty and academic technology directors, developed a program that brought faculty together for an annual faculty training event. In 2016, the focus of this event shifted to OER and Open Pedagogy which continued through 2021 when the funding was not renewed unexpectedly. But not all was lost. In this session, we will discuss what was lost and what was gained in the process. We will also have time for the audience to share their own ideas for sustainability.

Audience: Librarian, Administrators, Staff, Librarians

Level: All

• Reta Chaffe is the Director of Educational Technology at Granite State College, University System of NH, where she oversees the Instructional Design Team. She was a founding member of the former USNH Academic Technology Steering Committee (2008-2021) and a current member of NH Open Education Consortium as well as the OER & Equity Work Group of the DOERs3 organization.