Open Educational Resources are teaching, learning, and research resources that reside in the public domain or have been released under an intellectual property license that permits their free use and repurposing by others. OER include full courses, course materials, modules, textbooks, streaming videos, tests, software, and any other tools, materials, or techniques used to support access to knowledge.
Augusta University is committed to providing affordable aducation to all students. One way the university is doing this is by promoting the design, use, and adoption of affordable and Open Education Resources. A team of three local representatives (the “Champions”) of Affordable Learning Georgia will be happy to answer your questions about open learning materials.
Affordable Learning Georgia is issuing a Request for Proposals for Round 21 of the Affordable Materials Grants. The deadline is Feb. 14, 2022.
Affordable Learning Georgia’s Affordable Materials Grants are intended to:
Explore and expand course materials transformation to include the adoption, adaptation,
and creation of Open Educational Resources (OER); the adoption of materials available
through GALILEO and USG libraries; and the use of other no-cost and low-cost materials.
Provide support and time to faculty instructors, librarians, instructional designers,
and other professional staff to meet, plan, review, and implement these approaches.
Work toward equitable access to materials and lower materials costs for students and
contribute to their retention, progression, and graduation.
Examples of grant projects include:
• Adopting an OpenStax sociology textbook in place of a commercial textbook for an introduction to sociology course
and creating new ancillary materials to support the adoption
• Adapting existing calculus OER to fit the learning outcomes of your particular course and then adopting these new
materials in place of a commercial textbook
• Creating new OER to adopt in place of a commercial textbook when there are no OER to cover the subject
• Creating a library reading list to adopt in place of a commercial textbook when there are no OER to cover the subject
• Adopting a low-cost homework or adaptive solution, such as Lumen Learning’s Waymaker or OHM, OpenStax Partner courseware, or other low-cost materials, to ensure total required resource costs for students
are below $40.00
To apply for an Affordable Materials Grant, please visit the RFP page for Round 21:
For medical reasons, along with not much changing between our previous December meeting and this one, we’re calling off the meeting set for this Thursday, January 6th.
In the meantime, please share the Round 21 RFP with your colleagues at your institutions! The deadline is February 14th.
Affordable Learning Georgia is issuing a Request for Proposals for two rounds of Affordable Materials Grants. To apply for an Affordable Materials Grant, please visit the RFP page for either Round 20 or Round 21.
Affordable Learning Georgia (ALG) organizes grant proposal reviewers on a yearly basis. Reviewers will have a one-year commitment during specified weeks of review with an expected 40 hours total for the year. Compensation is $400 honorarium per round ($800 total), distributed through your institution's payroll, through one Service Level Agreement (SLA) with the institution for the year (see the application form for more details). The time commitment is two grant rounds in FY 2022:
• Round 20: November 2-16, 2021, approximately 20 hours over the course of two weeks.
• Round 21: February 15-March 1, 2022, approximately 20 hours over the course of two weeks. Reviewer Application Deadline: Monday, October 4, 2021, 11:59 PM Notifications:
Friday, October 8, 2021 Please note that you cannot apply for a grant (see the reminder below) and be a grant reviewer in the same year.
Open Education Resources
Summerville Campus
U-235
2500 Walton Way
Augusta, GA 30904
706-446-5556
Add a mention that you are using an open source license on your work. You retain the copyrights on your work, but it simply states that you allow (under conditions that you can fix) re-distribution and modifications of your work.
Make sure your material is publicly available, by e.g. uploading it to Augusta University's Instituitional Repository. This will increase its visibility and attracts feedback.
Consult this guide from the University library to help you find open learning resource
Get in touch with your campus champions to help you get started, and possibly obtain financial and technical support by applying to an Affordable Materials Grants from Affordable Learning Georgia (ALG)
The best places to get started are:
Grant Opportunities Open Educational Resources Customizing and Authoring Content
Learning materials dubbed “open” are re-usable, redistributable and editable material of all nature (textbook, laboratory handbooks, exams yearbooks, homework, primary source, etc.) that are generally cost-free. Adopting those for a class has multiple benefits.
If instructors are using existing open learning materials:
If instructors are developing their own material:
Once a month, join Affordable Learning Georgia to hear from recent Affordable Materials Grant completers about their affordability projects, the challenges they faced, and the results they saw on implementation. For more information or to join a session, visit Affordable Learning Georgia.
Upcoming Sessions
Open Course Design with Accessibility in Mind - Monday, March 1, 2021 12:00pm-12:45pm
Join Jason Rodenbeck, KSU's Assistant Director of Academic Web Accessibility, as he shares his expertise on creating accessible online courses while incorporating Open Educational Resources.
Share and Share Alike: A Guide to Creative Commons Licenses - Tuesday March 2, 2021 12:00pm-12:45pm
Librarian Nikki Cannon-Rech will be joining us from Georgia Southern University to explain the intricacies of the Creative Commons Licenses and how they connect to the 5 Rs of OER.
The OER Files: Open Education Myths Explained - Wednesday, March 3, 2021 1:30pm-2:15pm
Think Open Educational Resources are low quality? Think again! Jeff Gallant and Tiffani Reardon from Affordable Learning Georgia will bust common myths surrounding OER. The truth is out there...
Access Granted: An OER Panel Discussion with KSU Faculty - Thursday March 4, 2021 12:00pm-12:45pm
Faculty hoping to author or adopt Open Educational Resources within their courses should plan to attend this informative panel discussion, in which ALG Textbook Transformation Grant recipients will relay their experiences. Moderated by Dr. Tammy Powell, Director of the CHSS Office of Digital Education.
Green Means Go: Depositing Your Lesson Plan into an Institutional Repository - Friday, March 5, 2021 12:00pm-12:45pm
Co-presenters Elizabeth Thomas and Heather Hankins will provide listeners with steps to creating open lesson plans and sustaining open access by depositing those plans into the DigitalCommons, KSU's institutional repository.
