Open Educational Resources: RCC OER "GO Open" Initiative

Roxbury Community College's OER initiative is called "RCC Go Open."

RCC faculty- have you heard about Open Educational Resources? 

• They are free, openly licensed teaching materials that can be used in lieu of your traditional college textbooks.
• They allow every student in your course access to all the course reading on the first day of your class.
• They allow you to customize your text based on your teaching style, the needs of your specific course, your course learning outcomes and more.
• They allow you to control when the material needs updating and what should be updated.
• Did you read the part where we said the materials are FREE for your students?

RCC is seeking proposals to fund faculty work on OER projects.  Accepted proposals will be funded at $500 per proposal. This is an amazing opportunity to customize your course and make the materials your students NEED to be successful in your course available to them for free.

RCC “Go Open” initiative is seeking proposals from College faculty who want to replace their current publisher materials with open educational resources (OER).  By supporting open education, faculty can significantly lower the costs of textbooks for students. For more information on the OER initiative and to view the project summary, please visit the Information tab of this guide.

Proposals may be submitted in four categories based on levels of adoption:See Descriptions of levels

Call for proposals!

Adopt – Level 1

Redesign your course to incorporate an existing open textbook or open course content as is.  

• 1 Faculty member: $500
• 2 or More Faculty Members: $1,000 (stipend split between faculty members)

Adapt – Level 2

Remix existing open educational resources and create new open content to bridge gaps in available resources to enable a fully open course. New content may add missing chapters to existing OER or create ancillaries such as quiz question banks, lecture slides, or lab manuals.

• 1 Faculty member: $750
• 2 or More Faculty Members: $1500 (stipend split between faculty members)

Build – Level 3

Create a substantially new open textbook or fully open course where it is possible to demonstrate that quality resources are not currently available to meet learning objectives.

• 1 Faculty member $1000
• 2 or more Faculty members: $1,500 (faculty will split stipend if more than one person participates)

Requirements for stipend recipients:

Share your work with an appropriate Creative Commons open license so that others can easily adopt and reuse.

• Provide electronic copies of all work developed as part of this project with an appropriate CC-BY open license by the deadline stated in the application. 
• Work with your RCC OER Task Force Representative to develop a timeline of deliverables, payment schedule, and assessment data.
• Publicize your work by providing RCC Go Open with updates; participating in webinars, workshops, and professional meetings.
• The final product may be reviewed by faculty teaching the same course at Roxbury Community College prior to payment.

Proposal Evaluation:

• Student savings/ class enrollment
• Quality considerations such as accessibility of proposed content, support for user experience and curriculum, appeal for future adoption in other settings, and demonstrated need to create new rather than reuse (if applicable)
• Department commitment (for example, redesign all sections of a class or all classes in a sequence)
• Feasibility of project as proposed 
• Priority will be given to faculty who have not yet had a chance to participate in this program. 

Round 1: Completed application forms are due on November 22, 2019 to the RCC OER Task Force. The RCC OER Task Force will notify applicants by December 4, 2019. Project timelines may vary but must be completed by January 10, 2020 for the Spring.

The grant evaluation committee is made up of members of the RCC OER Task force.

*Submit proposals here by filling out the online application form! It is strongly encouraged that you use this faculty planning worksheet to develop your ideas before applying for a grant.

References:

http://openoregon.org/call-for-proposals-open-educational-resources-grants/

https://maricopa.instructure.com/courses/811971

Proposals are due by 5:00 PM on November 22, 2019.  Apply for a grant by filling out the online application form.

If you need help, please contact me at whoag@rcc.mass.edu

Mission: The RCC OER Task Force mission is to support faculty development of Open Educational Resources (OER) proposals and OER usage in and outside of the classroom. The Task force is responsible for facilitating OER use and adoption throughout the curriculum of RCC and to become the “face” of OER on the campus as well as facilitating student success and engagement through affordable alternatives to textbook costs.

OER Taskforce Members:

Bill Hoag- Chair

Shannon Cavalieri

Daveen Blythe

Totsaporn Intarabumrung

Tesfay Aradom

Nikolaus Sucher

Jeffrey Breitenfeldt

Danielle Tabela

Jalal Ghaemghami

Keanna Hagood

Joyce Atkinson

Jennie Thrash

Jaysa Malone