OER Development Grants, Phase 7

By Megan Garvy | November 9, 2016

Grant proposals are now being accepted for OER Development Grants. For more information regarding the OER Development Grant program, please visit our website .

Proposals are due by 5pm Wednesday, November 9th, 2016.

OER (Open Educational Resources) hold great promise for reducing costs and increasing access to required course materials. Community colleges around the country (Washington, California, Virginia) have joined in with national efforts to increase the production and use of OER materials. Washington’s OER project saved students over $1.25 million in just the 2011-12 academic year, and over $5.5 million since 2011.

The main goal of the Maricopa Millions Open Education Resources (OER) Project is to reduce educational costs for students. Spending less money on textbooks and materials will foster greater access to materials for students, which may enable them to stay on track with completing their courses.

The Maricopa Millions OER Project includes developing a strategic, sustainable OER infrastructure that would include: awareness, professional development, OER development and technical support, marketing and technical structure. In order for OER to be successful at MCCCD, we have established an OER strategic planning and implementation team to establish and oversee specific OER outcomes over the next 5 years.

The driving objective for the project is to save MCCCD students $5 Million Dollars over the next five years through the use of OER materials. And we’ve already reached our goal in 2 1/2 years, but we’re not stopping there.

This Maricopa Millions OER project, through an internal grant process, supports the adoption, adaptation, and development of complete OER course materials for high enrollment courses in the MCCCD. The final product will be OER course materials that can be easily adopted and modified by other faculty (including adjuncts) teaching that course. Phase 1-3 targeted high enrollment courses. In Phase 4-6 we welcomed all courses to be submitted for the grant.

In Phase 7 we continue to welcome all courses to be submitted for the grant with emphasis on courses that meet degree completion requirements for CS, Oral Communication, Critical Reading, H or G. Keep in mind, most math courses and the following courses (ENG091, ENG101, ENG102, RDG091, CHM130LL, GBS151, PSY101, PSY230, BIO156,BIO160, CHM130, CHM150/151/152, HES100, SPA101 and SWU292) are not eligible, as they have already been funded and/or developed.

Proposals are due by 5pm on Wednesday, November 9, 2016. Group proposals will be accepted and are encouraged.For more information regarding the OER Development Grant program, please visit our website.

This program is open to residential and adjunct faculty teaching at the MCCCD and will be open to all courses in Phase 7 of the grant program.