Using an OER
Jessica Kirschner
What is an OER?
Open educational resources (OER) are openly-licensed, freely available educational materials that can be modified and redistributed by users. They can include any type of educational resource, from syllabi to full courses.
- Openly-licensed: The content is released under an open license. You can read about this more in the “Creative Commons and Selecting a License” chapter in Publishing with VIVA.
- Freely Available: The resources must be freely available online with no fee to access. Physical OER may be sold at low prices, to offset the cost of printing.
- Modifiable: The resource must be made available under an open license that allows for editing. Ideally, it should also be available in an editable format.
The most comprehensive definition of OER available today is provided by the Hewlett Foundation:
“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.”[1]
With a definition so broad that it includes any educational material so long as it is free to access and open, it might be easier to ask, “What isn’t an OER?”
What is Not an OER?
If a resource is not free or openly licensed, it cannot be described as an OER. For example, most materials accessed through your library’s subscriptions cannot be altered, remixed, or redistributed. These materials require special permission to use and therefore cannot be considered “open.” Table 1 below explains the difference between OER and other resources often misattributed as OER.
| Material Type | Openly Licensed | Freely Available | Modifiable |
| Open educational resources | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Free online resources under all rights reserved copyright | No | Yes | No |
| Materials available through the University Library | No | Yes | No |
| Open access articles and monographs | Yes | Yes | Maybe |
Note: Although some materials are free to access for a library’s users, that does not mean that they are free to access for everyone (including the library). Similarly, while some open access resources are made available under a copyright license that enables modification, this is not always the case.
Open Licensing
While an OER can be assigned any type of open license, Creative Commons are the most commonly used in open education.
Creative Commons Overview
Creative Commons licenses function within the copyright system. Creators who assign their works a Creative Commons license still own the copyright to their work, but they have determined that they do not wish to retain all the rights that copyright provides to them. Instead, they say that users can access and share their works (and maybe more depending on the license) without asking for permission.
Creative Commons is a non-profit organization who has written and released th