Welcome to the Open Educational Resources site by TCSG's Distance Education Department. Here you will find information about what OERs are as well as Creative Commons information. You'll also find OER Courses and shared OER courses that are available for download via your Blackboard Administrators. The OpenTech Tracker consists of OER resources that other TCSG faculty have used and may be beneficial to you. Lastly, you'll find links to where you can find open resources. Hopefully, you'll find the information here helpful as we strive to make learning easier for all students at TCSG.
What are Open Educational Resources (OER)?
Open resources make education more accessible and affordable due to their free and open nature. This translates to real benefits — and cost savings — for students.
- OER can be any teaching, learning, or research material, from complete courses to textbooks to lecture slides.
- OER are publicly available.
- OER are free to access.
- OER are free from copyright restrictions.
What are open educational resources (OER)? by The OpenStax Team | Jul 22, 2024
“Open Educational Resources (OERs) are any type of educational materials that are in the public domain or introduced with an open license. The nature of these open materials means that anyone can legally and freely copy, use, adapt and re-share them. OERs range from textbooks to curricula, syllabi, lecture notes, assignments, tests, projects, audio, video and animation.”
"Explaining Open Educational Resources" by David Wiley is licensed under CC BY 4.0
“Open Educational Resources are teaching, learning and research materials in any medium – digital or otherwise – that reside in the public domain or have been released under an open license that permits no-cost access, use, adaptation and redistribution by others with no or limited restrictions.” (Hewlett Foundation)
"Explaining Open Educational Resources" by David Wiley is licensed under CC BY 4.0
The 5 Rs of Open Education
Instructors often view the “open” element of OER within the 5R framework:
What are open educational resources (OER)? by The OpenStax Team | Jul 22, 2024
You can create and own copies of an open resource. You can search for, save, and use OER content from a wide variety of sources. You (and your students) can also download the content to your computer or phone.
Creative Commons
Creative Commons is a nonprofit organization that enables the sharing and use of creativity and knowledge through free legal tools.
Their free, easy-to-use copyright licenses provide a simple, standardized way to give the public permission to share and use your creative work — on conditions of your choice.
CC License Conditions
All licenses are based on four (4) conditions.
"Creative Commons Licences" by Creative Commons is licensed under CC BY 4.0
The Core Suite of CC Licenses
"What is Creative Commons?" by Creative Commons is licensed under CC BY 3.0
| The bottom two licenses are marked as Not OER, and this is because a lot of people in the OER community feel that if you cannot adapt or modify a work, it’s not truly open. These two bottom licenses have a condition of no derivative, which means you cannot change the work. It can only be used as is. |
If you have any questions regarding the information on this site, contact your college POC (Blackboard Administrator).