Subject Guides: Open Educational Resources (OERs): Introduction

Image by Pexels from Pixabay

"Open education is a philosophy about the way people should produce, share, and build on knowledge. Proponents of open education believe everyone in the world should have access to high-quality educational experiences and resources, and they work to eliminate barriers to this goal."

Opensource.com

What are OERs?

Open Educational Resources (OERs) are educational materials that are in the public domain or published under open licences (such as Creative Commons) that specify how they can be used, reused, adapted and shared. OERs can include textbooks, curricula, syllabi, lecture notes, assignments, tests, projects, audio, video and software.

Open Educational Resources by the IDP (CC BY 3.0)

Open Access Journals

For information on publishing in open access journals please see our publishing guide

Image created by UOW Library and shared under CC BY-SA licence.

Federation University Strategic Plan & Living Values

Open Textbooks align with the University’s Living Values of Inclusion, Innovation, Excellence, Empowerment, and Collaboration.

Equity and access to education are key social justice drivers to which the University is committed.

Federation University Library encourages the adoption of Open Textbooks for teaching:

to reduce costs and access barriers to students
to provide potential for pedagogic innovation for teaching staff
to share excellence and build collaboration.

The value offered by the use and adoption of Open Textbooks aligns with the following goals in the University's Strategic Plan:

Transform lives
- World-class multi-sector education available to all
- Positive career and life impact
- Broad access, diversity and inclusion, acknowledging our Indigenous heritage
A strong and sustainable University
- High quality, relevant and profitable educational offerings
- First choice employer and destination for students in each of our communities
- A focus on sustainability
Relentless innovation and reinvention
- A world with continuous innovation and reinvention will drive how Australians work, live and learn.
Technology in education
- The impact of technology on pedagogy has transformed how universities operate and students learn. We must use technology to drive high quality and connected experiences for our customers.
Lifelong learning
- The way in which our customers access skills is increasingly focused on a continual skills acquisition approach, requiring us to offer new ways of learning, more often and more quickly.
Understand and support learner diversity
- Provide a suite of educational opportunities and programs that embrace diversity, and which reflect an increasingly divergent customer base, through the use of effective market intelligence, engagement, monitoring and improvement.
Digital-first approach
- Digital technology embedded in all we do, to deliver a high-quality and personalised experience at scale for students, staff and partners, as well as to reduce duplication.

UN Sustainable Development Goals

The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), also known as the Global Goals, were adopted by the United Nations in 2015 as a universal call to action to end poverty, protect the planet, and ensure that by 2030 all people enjoy peace and prosperity.

The Library sees the use of Open Textbooks as a way for the University to contribute to the SDGs, particularly Goal 4.

Goal 4: Quality Education
Ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all Goal 1: No Poverty?

The use of Open Textbooks may also contribute to the following SDGs

Goal 5: Gender equality
Achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls
Goal 12: Responsible consumption and production
Ensure sustainable consumption and production patterns

Image of The United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, 2018, from WikiMedia Commons.

Australian Human Rights Commission

Below are selected excerpts that would be supported by the use of Open Textbooks

Right to Education

ICESCR Article 13
- (c) Higher education shall be made equally accessible to all, on the basis of capacity, by every appropriate means, and in particular by the progressive introduction of free education;
CEDAW Article 10
- (c) The elimination of any stereotyped concept of the roles of men and women at all levels and in all forms of education by encouraging coeducation and other types of education which will help to achieve this aim and, in particular, by the revision of textbooks and school programmes and the adaptation of teaching methods;
The Covention on the Rights of the Child
- Article 28: (c) Make higher education accessible to all on the basis of capacity by every appropriate means;
- Article 29: c) The development of respect for the child's parents, his or her own cultural identity, language and values, for the national values of the country in which the child is living, the country from which he or she may originate, and for civilizations different from his or her own;
CRPD Article 24
- b. The development by persons with disabilities of their personality, talents and creativity, as well as their mental and physical abilities, to their fullest potential;
- b. Persons with disabilities can access an inclusive, quality and free primary education and secondary education on an equal basis with others in the communities in which they live;