AOER Blog - Research Guides at University of Northern Colorado

headshot of Melinda Gurule At the very start of my undergraduate program, I learned very quickly about the high cost of textbooks. As a first-generation college student, I was thankful to be a part of a TRIO program, Educational Talent Search (ETS) that had spoken about preparing for some of these financial challenges we could face when we entered college. To save money, I had learned from this program and those before me that it was a good idea to go to the textbook store early before classes began to be able to buy the best used books to save money and I did just that. I found that this method worked most of the time, but sometimes I had to purchase brand-new books wrapped up in plastic. Purchase of books and ways to save money was often on my mind as each semester approached throughout my entire undergraduate program. Thankfully, I was able to make things work financially with the help of scholarships, tips from peers, and even a lucky game of Bingo with my grandmother one semester to get the items I needed for my courses.

Experiences growing up as a first-generation college student and summer job experience during my undergraduate program led me to a career in student support. For almost 20 years, I have worked for student support programs beginning as an Academic Advisor and later Assistant Director for a local TRIO program serving over 600 first-generation and/or low-income students prepare to make their way to be the first in their families to go to college and earn a degree. For the last seven years, I have had the privilege of working in the Division of Student Academic Success as a Success Coach and Advisor for the Soar Office here at the University of Northern Colorado. Although there were some differences in serving students in a pre-collegiate program versus the college level, the financial challenges and concerns on both ends have been consistent.

Throughout my time at UNC, I have had several conversations with students at the start of each semester where a student informs me that they had to delay the purchase of books until they could afford it. We then look for books on reserve, the possibility of sharing a book with a peer, and communication with their instructors. Depending on the course, these methods are not always successful to help them get by. My observation with this delay in purchase often leads to falling behind in class, poor grades, and at times the inability to complete the course. For those that decide to make sacrifices to purchase books on time sometimes take from other budget areas to make it work. One of my previous students once shared that she had to take money from her gas and food budget to purchase books because she said, “for me buying books determines if I pass a class successfully with a good grade or not.”

In fall of 2022 I was asked if I wanted to join UNC’s Affordable and Open Educational Resources (AOER) committee. At the time, I did not know what this was about, so I spoke with some members of the committee, and I learned that AOER is about affordable/low-cost or free learning and research materials that carry legal permissions for the opportunities of revision and redistribution. Wow! Affordable and free access to books for students? What a great opportunity for me to continue to advocate and support not only Soar students with textbook cost challenges, but all UNC students, so I quickly joined. My time as a committee member made me aware of not only what AOER were about but made me aware of courses on campus already utilizing OER. With this knowledge, I have been able to better support students by looking into OER course opportunities for them and it allowed me to share information with other advisors in my network.

Once I learned about instructors that had made OER an opportunity for their students, I was eager to learn more about the student perspective. As further conversations occurred with students that mentioned they had taken an OER class or two, I wanted to know how OER influenced their learning experience and what impact it had on financial cost savings. One of my students, Jessica Guerra, offered to share some insight into her own experiences below:

Hi! My name is Jessica, and I am one of Melinda’s students in Soar; currently, I am a Junior studying Psychology with a minor in Human Services. AOER in my courses have helped me immensely when it came to the cost of materials for courses. I have taken many classes where the professor has used AOER including PSY 166 Skills and Careers, PSY 323 Health Psych, HON 101 Critical Thinking, HUSR 205 Intro to Human Services, PHIL 100 Intro to Philosophy, and PSY 230 Lifespan Development. Within these classes having these free and accessible resources, I have probably saved $1000 dollars or more!

Not only does it save me money on the cost of books, but it also saves me trouble in trying to figure out what site to use if the link isn’t provided to find a cheaper book, or if I have to order a hard copy, waiting till the last minute for the book to arrive before the first few assignments are due to read the required text. Instead, the professor provides the materials on Canvas and I am able to access them whenever and wherever I need and want. I am a part of the AOER committee with the hope of encouraging more professors to change their courses to open educational or affordable resources.

OER provide open books and access to support students. I am thankful for the opportunity to learn about OER and be part of a community bringing about awareness. I encourage students to reach out to faculty and inquire about OER for their classes and look for opportunities to engage in an OER course when you register for classes. See how to find OER classes at UNC on the student page on the UNC OER website. I encourage faculty to look into this possibility and see if OER could be right for you.

As a master’s student in professional counseling, I would estimate I spent nearly $500 on textbooks during my first year in the program, with the book content ranging from the basic introduction to the counseling profession, to diagnostic manuals and treatment planning resources. While I am excited to be pursuing my dreams, especially as a first-generation student, the cost of higher education has become an increasingly salient issue for me as I have progressed through my education. I often find myself wondering, when all is said and done and I walk across the stage as Dr. Henderson someday, how much will I have spent on my education, on tuition and books, from my bachelor’s degree to my doctorate? I know I am not alone in wondering this and feel that it has become a question that many students find themselves asking. The cost of education, and the materials that go along with our education, have become a substantial barrier for many to academic success. Some may argue that if students cannot afford the textbooks for classes, they can use their university library’s resources, but with limited resources that are often utilized by more than one student, many are left scrambling to access course materials that often determine their success in the course. While student success is a multi-faceted issue, I feel that we set many of our students up for failure by requiring expensive textbooks for courses, especially courses that are required to complete a degree. How can we address this textbook issue so that students have financially friendly options for class materials as they work toward their goals?

I first learned of open educational resources (OER) during my first semester of graduate school. In search of a job, I had applied for a position with UNC’s University Libraries as an OER graduate student employee. I remember reading through the job description and thinking to myself, “This position sounds great, and I think I’m qualified, but I have no idea what OER is!” Luckily, I landed the position, and had the opportunity to steadily learn all about OER for the next few months. The benefits of using OER in classrooms quickly became clear, and I realized that increasing the use of OER materials could help to alleviate some of the financial burden for students in higher education. However, I found myself wondering why I had not heard of OER before, and why professors were not using these resources in place of expensive textbooks more often. If we have the tools to make higher education more accessible and affordable, why aren’t we using them? I wonder if part of the issue stems from common misconceptions of OER, with one of the biggest misconceptions about OER materials being that because they are free, they must be of lower quality. While I am sure that OER materials exist out there which certainly are of lower quality, the materials I have come across and worked with during my time with University Libraries have been of overwhelmingly high quality. Many sites which offer collections of OER also offer rating systems for individual materials and provide users an opportunity to leave honest reviews and even suggestions for changing the material. In fact, one of the coolest aspects of OER is how customizable the content often is; using OER offers professors the opportunity to edit materials to better fit the focus of the course and its unique learning outcomes. While integrating OER into a course can be a learning curve, plenty of resources exist to make the process easier. To the professors considering OER, I encourage you to learn more and give it a chance; in making the jump to using OER, we provide our students with customized, high-quality, and affordable materials that contribute to their learning and overall success in higher education.

image of Willy Maxwell, UNC Bookstore manager Open educational resources (OER) learning materials are openly licensed digital educational materials that can be used instead of traditional textbooks and other courseware. The concept has been available for some time but is emerging now as a viable option to reduce the cost of learning materials while still providing rich, up-to-date content.

A recent study finds that one in nine students currently uses OER materials, and of that group, more than half use it to supplement print or digital textbooks. Instructors that consider price when selecting course materials may achieve the goal of reducing costs by assigning more OER. Professors can design courses on their own by building on available content from OER aggregators that host large collections of open resources. The process requires careful vetting to ensure the materials are high quality, peer reviewed and formatted properly.

Another option is to adopt OER content curated by a third party. For example, Lumen Learning reviews content from a variety of sources, selects the best available OER and adds timely updates, learning design and technical support to produce effective courseware for introductory courses, general education and developmental education available through an LMS. Working with Follett, students are charged only $10 to $25, which represents a significant savings compared to the cost of traditional learning materials. OER have already proven to increase student success measured by course completions and grades earned of a C or better. Students using OER enjoy an average of 83 percent savings with the same or better learning outcomes.

Becky Smith Open Educational Resources (OER) expand educational opportunities and are a great tool for all students. These resources aim to remove legal, financial, and technical barriers that can prevent access. But how do they measure up for disabled students? The truth is that many OER are not designed with inclusivity in mind for disabled students. From a disability support program perspective, there is a long way to go before digital materials are accessible to everyone. In the meantime, there is some good news. OER are still a better choice than traditional resources for college students with disabilities and here are some reasons why:

Permissions granted by an open license remove legal barriers to adapting and customizing OER, making it possible to create learning environments that are more flexible and robust for all students.
OER offer the opportunity for instructors to curate materials authored by a diverse set of individuals, including those who identify as disabled, normalizing and reducing stigma while sharing viewpoints that have historically been marginalized.
Unlike commercially published materials, OER that are adapted to meet accessibility requirements can be retained and freely shared with communities, reducing duplicative work at and across institutions.
OER adoption can reduce costs, which benefits all students, but can be especially beneficial for students with disabilities who may face additional financial pressures.
It is more common for OER to be shared in formats that can be adapted for accessibility, unlike proprietary publisher content where editable files are notably difficult to obtain.

There has also been a significant push by university disability service offices and educators to encourage campuses to adopt universal design principles when developing courses and materials. Universal design is a concept for designing and delivering products or services that are useable by people with the widest range of capabilities. There are seven principles of universal design. One organization that aims to incorporate universal design principles and expand inclusive and equitable practices, specifically for OER, is the Flexible Learning for Open Education or FLOE Project which offers an Inclusive Learning Design Handbook. The handbook is, itself, an OER designed to help others create resources that are accessible to a diverse range of individual needs and learning preferences. Resources like the FLOE Project and others are great tools for creating inclusive learning resources without having to reinvent the wheel. The key is to be aware of the diverse needs of learners. Whether it is your plan to adopt or design OER please keep in mind inclusivity for all. While all OER are not created equally, there are still benefits for all students over traditional resources.

Thomas, C. (2018, October 8). OER and Accessibility: Working Toward Inclusive Learning. Retrieved from https://sparcopen.org/news/2018/oer-accessibility-working-toward-inclusive-learning/

A Success Coach/Advisor and Student Share their Stories About Open and Affordable Course Materials by Melinda Gurule, Success Coach and Academic Advisor, and Jessica Guerra, Undergraduate Psychology major

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