Open Access materials are freely available on the internet and they can be used in instruction. However, the Creative Commons license will determine if the Open Access material can be considered an Open Educational Resource.
The following chart shows which licenses are the most open and which would be considered OER.
5.4 Creating and Sharing OER | Creative Commons Certificate for Educators, Academic Librarians and GLAM. https://certificates.creativecommons.org/cccertedu/chapter/6-4-creating-and-sharing-oer/. Accessed 28 Nov. 2021.
Creative Commons Licensing, OA, & OER © 2021 by Naulayne Enders is licensed under CC BY 4.0 
The world of Open Access and Open Educational Resources is growing and it is important to understand how to navigate it in order to use it effectively for both personal research and as instructional resources for our students. On this page you will find definitions for both Open Access (OA) and Open Educational Resources (OER). It will also help you to see how they work together. Remember that if you have any questions, you can always contact the library at nenders@kcu.edu.
"OA-OER-circle" by susankung is licensed under CC BY 2.0
Open Access is generally concerned with scholarly communication. The materials and concepts you are researching and how you are sharing that with others in the scholarly community. The Budapest Open Access Initiative defines Open Access (OA) in the following way:
"Open Access (OA) to research means free 'availability on the public internet, permitting any users to read, download, copy, distribute, print, search, or link to the full texts of [research] articles, crawl them for indexing, pass them as data to software, or use them for any other lawful purpose, without financial, legal, or technical barriers other than those inseparable from gaining access to the internet itself. The only constraint on reproduction and distribution and the only role for copyright in this domain should be to give authors control over the integrity of their work and the right to be properly acknowledged and cited.'"
5.1 Open Access to Scholarship | Creative Commons Certificate for Educators, Academic Librarians and GLAM. https://certificates.creativecommons.org/cccertedu/chapter/6-1-open-access-to-scholarship/. Accessed 27 Nov. 2021.
In an Open Access model, these are the important components:
5.1 Open Access to Scholarship | Creative Commons Certificate for Educators, Academic Librarians and GLAM. https://certificates.creativecommons.org/cccertedu/chapter/6-1-open-access-to-scholarship/. Accessed 27 Nov. 2021.
Once you have decided to make your research available through Open Access, what are your options? There are two popular ways that you can publish.
Green OA - You can publish your material by making it freely available in a repository. This repository could be based at Kentucky Christian and be University specific, it could be one that is subject specific, and Kentucky is currently working on creating an open repository for the state. Several students have asked to have access to your dissertations as they have worked on capstone projects in recent years.
Gold OA - You also have the option of making the final version of your manuscript available by publishing it and having the publisher make it available immediately. This is usually done by publishing in an Open Access Journal under an open license. Examples of these journals would be journals listed under the Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ) and journals listed under the Public Library of Science (PLOS).
The important thing to remember is that you have options with publishing your research.
"File:DOAJ logo.jpg" by Doajplus is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0
"PLoS: The Public Library of Science" by dullhunk is licensed under CC BY 2.0
5.1 Open Access to Scholarship | Creative Commons Certificate for Educators, Academic Librarians and GLAM. https://certificates.creativecommons.org/cccertedu/chapter/6-1-open-access-to-scholarship/. Accessed 27 Nov. 2021.
| Open Access Publishing | Traditional Publishing |
|---|---|
| Digital, online publishing | Slow, print and sometimes digital publishing |
| Free of Charge | Expensive - author may pay for publication |
| Free of most copyright and licensing restrictions | Research may be publicly funded but results are often hidden behind technical, legal and financial barriers or pay walls |
| Easy to use to promote collaboration and discovery | Ill-suited to collaboration and discovery |
5.1 Open Access to Scholarship | Creative Commons Certificate for Educators, Academic Librarians and GLAM. https://certificates.creativecommons.org/cccertedu/chapter/6-1-open-access-to-scholarship/. Accessed 27 Nov. 2021.
The purpose of research at the University level is to contribute to the advancing of knowledge and scholarship in our fields. The easier this information is to access, the easier it is for it to be added to the knowledge base and used by others. Open Access allows this information to be published in peer-reviewed journals as well as on electronic list-servs. It allows the creators to maintain control of their published works. Students and peers can easily access the material when it is not behind publisher paywalls or subscription databases provided by a University library. As our students graduate, their access to information to help them to continue to develop in their field is available through those Open Access resources.
"Ultimately, the open access approach is more efficient, equitable, affordable, and collaborative."
5.1 Open Access to Scholarship | Creative Commons Certificate for Educators, Academic Librarians and GLAM. https://certificates.creativecommons.org/cccertedu/chapter/6-1-open-access-to-scholarship/. Accessed 27 Nov. 2021.
Open Education is "an idea, a set of content practices, policy, and community which, properly leveraged, can help everyone in the world access free, effective, open learning materials for the marginal cost of zero."
The technical definition for Open Educational Resources (OER) is that "they are teaching learning, and research materials that are either
(a) in the public domain
or
(b) licensed in a manner that provides everyone with free and perpetual permission to engage in the 5 R activities (retain, reuse, revise, remix, redistribute)."
A more general definition is that "OER are education materials that can be freely downloaded, edited, and shared to better serve all students."
"OER is sharing" by giulia.forsythe is marked with CC0 1.0
Open Textbook - is defined as a collection of OER that have been organized to look like a traditional textbook in order to make the adoption process easier.
5.2 OER, Open Textbooks, and Open Courses | Creative Commons Certificate for Educators, Academic Librarians and GLAM. https://certificates.creativecommons.org/cccertedu/chapter/6-2-oer-open-textbooks-open-courses/. Accessed 28 Nov. 2021.
The best way to identify an open educational resource is to determine if the resource is:
Being able to create derivative works is important in OER and is included in the definition by stating that the 5 Rs must be able to be applied to a work in order for it to be an OER material. Those 5 Rs are:
5.2 OER, Open Textbooks, and Open Courses | Creative Commons Certificate for Educators, Academic Librarians and GLAM. https://certificates.creativecommons.org/cccertedu/chapter/6-2-oer-open-textbooks-open-courses/. Accessed 28 Nov. 2021.
As with all course materials, you will also want to evaluate OER materials for your course. The Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC) is a digital services and solutions non-for profit that focuses on education in the UK. They have suggested the following criteria to be used in evaluating resources:
Remember that you are the best judge of what resources will benefit your students the most and meet your curriculum goals. David Wiley, the chief academic officer at Lumen Learning, has two blog posts that are worth reading concerning OER materials. He states, "Be careful not to get pulled into a debate about "high or low quality education resources" when what educators should really be concerned about is 'effectiveness.'" He also makes the statement that, "..when materials are so expensive that students can't afford them, they are perfectly ineffective." These posts are worth reading as you decide on using OER materials for your course.
5.3 Finding, Evaluating, and Adapting Resources | Creative Commons Certificate for Educators, Academic Librarians and GLAM. https://certificates.creativecommons.org/cccertedu/chapter/6-3-finding-evaluating-and-adapting-resources/. Accessed 28 Nov. 2021.
“David Wiley, PhD.” David Wiley, PhD, http://davidwiley.org/. Accessed 28 Nov. 2021.
No, Really – Stop Saying “High Quality” – Improving Learning. https://opencontent.org/blog/archives/3830. Accessed 28 Nov. 2021.
Open Educational Resources InfoKit / Quality Considerations. https://openeducationalresources.pbworks.com/w/page/24838164/Quality%20considerations. Accessed 28 Nov. 2021.
Stop Saying “High Quality” – Improving Learning. https://opencontent.org/blog/archives/3821. Accessed 28 Nov. 2021.
Why are OER possible?
5.2 OER, Open Textbooks, and Open Courses | Creative Commons Certificate for Educators, Academic Librarians and GLAM. https://certificates.creativecommons.org/cccertedu/chapter/6-2-oer-open-textbooks-open-courses/. Accessed 28 Nov. 2021.
Even though students have access to internet resources, the cost of educational resources is rising and is becoming less affordable for students. While all of Kentucky Christian faculty and the bookstore make an effort to reduce the cost of textbooks for individual students, the fact remains that the books for each course as a whole are often too expensive for some of our students. Fewer students are purchasing textbooks for a course and it is affecting their ability to succeed.
We also know that some materials for courses are moving to an online format. However, those books are not always available for perpetual access, but are only available for streaming for a specified amount of time. Copyright restrictions, digital rights management software on electronic resources, limitations on devices that can be used to access the online materials, and other printing restrictions limit what both instructors as well as students can do to access and use course materials.
Utilizing Open Educational Resources (OER) for courses means that all students in a course will have equal access to the same materials. Instructors will not have to worry that textbooks have not yet arrived in the bookstore and the bookstore will be able to provide print copies of materials for those students who do not want to use online materials.
"Education is fundamentally about sharing knowledge and ideas."
5.2 OER, Open Textbooks, and Open Courses | Creative Commons Certificate for Educators, Academic Librarians and GLAM. https://certificates.creativecommons.org/cccertedu/chapter/6-2-oer-open-textbooks-open-courses/. Accessed 28 Nov. 2021.
5.1 Open Access to Scholarship | Creative Commons Certificate for Educators, Academic Librarians and GLAM. https://certificates.creativecommons.org/cccertedu/chapter/6-1-open-access-to-scholarship/. Accessed 27 Nov. 2021.
5.2 OER, Open Textbooks, and Open Courses | Creative Commons Certificate for Educators, Academic Librarians and GLAM. https://certificates.creativecommons.org/cccertedu/chapter/6-2-oer-open-textbooks-open-courses/. Accessed 28 Nov. 2021.
5.3 Finding, Evaluating, and Adapting Resources | Creative Commons Certificate for Educators, Academic Librarians and GLAM. https://certificates.creativecommons.org/cccertedu/chapter/6-3-finding-evaluating-and-adapting-resources/. Accessed 28 Nov. 2021.
5.4 Creating and Sharing OER | Creative Commons Certificate for Educators, Academic Librarians and GLAM. https://certificates.creativecommons.org/cccertedu/chapter/6-4-creating-and-sharing-oer/. Accessed 28 Nov. 2021.
“David Wiley, PhD.” David Wiley, PhD, http://davidwiley.org/. Accessed 28 Nov. 2021.
No, Really – Stop Saying “High Quality” – Improving Learning. https://opencontent.org/blog/archives/3830. Accessed 28 Nov. 2021.
Open Educational Resources InfoKit / Quality Considerations. https://openeducationalresources.pbworks.com/w/page/24838164/Quality%20considerations. Accessed 28 Nov. 2021.
Stop Saying “High Quality” – Improving Learning. https://opencontent.org/blog/archives/3821. Accessed 28 Nov. 2021.
