New OER publication looks to the future

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Casserly, Smith are contributors

OER GUIDE FOR COMMUNITY COLLEGE LEADERS
An Open Educational Resources guide for higher education governance officials written by long-time OER advocate Hal Plotkin has been released by Creative Commons. Free to Learn: An Open Educational Resources Policy Development Guidebook for Community College Governance Officials provides an introduction to the basics of OER, an OER resource guide and insights from OER providers and institutions who have implemented supportive OER policies.

Carnegie Senior Partner and Vice President for Innovation and Open Networks Cathy Casserly describes the current state of the Open Educational Resources field in the publication. “It is amazing how the OER field has grown from an experiment to a worldwide movement in just over a decade,” she said. “What once seemed like an absurd idea to many—freely sharing knowledge so that others can reuse, repurpose and redistribute it—is beginning to seem intuitive to larger numbers of people and institutions. We are in a transitional stage between the point when early adopters made their commitment to OER and when we accomplish acceptance by what Everett Rogers referred to as the ‘early majority.’ In the next several years, it is easy to imagine OER making that full transition from a movement on the fringe to a sector fully embraced by the educational mainstream.”

Carnegie Visiting Scholar Mike Smith is quoted in the publication as saying “OER creates an unprecedented opportunity to bring continuously improving, high-quality courses within reach of more community college students, including at schools that might not otherwise be able to offer those courses.”