History

• In AY 2024-2025, 6,893 UHCC course sections, representing 36% of all sections, are designated TXT0. Total enrollment in TXT0 courses is 43,955.

• Year 4 of the UHCC OER Incentive Program. Three UHCC instructors complete the asynchronous OER 101 online course. The Lāmaku migration in Spring 2025 was a key factor in reducing faculty participation in OER training and development programs this year. 

• A total of $9,600 is awarded to two OER modification (OERMA) projects by three faculty from Kapiʻolani CC and Leeward CC, and two OER creation (OERCA) projects by two faculty from Kapiʻolani CC and Leeward CC.

• Estimated textbook cost savings to students in 2024-2025 is $4,395,500. Cumulative textbook savings at UHCC since 2016 are $29.6 million.

• Sheryl Shook and Amanda Lee Alimboyoguen (Kapiʻolani CC) present "Increase Student Engagement: Dip Your Toe in the Water, or Dive in, to Make a Splash with These Open Education Practices at the Kapiʻolani Summer Camp on August 8, 2024.

• UHCC faculty presented at the OE Global 2024 in Brisbane, Australia:

  • Leeward CC faculty members Daniela Elliott, Alyssa MacDonald, and Annemarie Paikai presented  “Hoʻi i Ke Kūmole: (Re)connecting to the Hawaiian Environment Through Open Pedagogy and Place-based Learning.” See session description. UHCC OER and Leeward CC Library provided travel funding support.

  • Ashley Biddle, Leeward CC Assistant Professor in Psychology, presented a lightning talk titled “Painting in Psychology Class: Multimodal Open Pedagogy.” 

• UHCC OER Project Leads Sheryl Shook, Leah Gazan, and Wayde Oshiro attend the 4th WICHE OERwest Convening in Boise, Idaho, April 8-9, 2025.

• Open 4 Peer Review Grant - Leeward Community College/UHCC is a sub-award participant ($45,000) in a three-year US Department of Education Open Textbook Pilot Grant project titled Open 4 Peer Review. The main sponsors of the grant project are Scottsdale Community College and the Maricopa County Community College District. The project aims to create standards and rubrics for evaluating OER for quality across six facets and to develop a technology platform for managing peer review and feedback. 

Year 3 of the UHCC OER Incentive Program. Fifteen UHCC instructors complete the asynchronous OER 101 online course.

A total of $11,300 is awarded to five OER modification (OERMA) projects by nine faculty from Kapiʻolani CC, Leeward CC, and UH Maui College.

In AY 2023-2024, 2,337 UHCC course sections, representing 34.7% of all sections, are designated TXT0. Total enrollment in TXT0 courses is 40,284.

Estimated textbook cost savings to students in 2023-2024 is $4,028,400. Cumulative textbook savings at UHCC since 2016 is over $25 million.

Annemarie Paikai and Wayde Oshiro (Leeward CC) present "Building a Native Hawaiian Place of Learning: Indigenization, OER, and the Library," at OEGlobal 2024 in Edmonton, Canada, on October 17-18, 2023. 

Wayde Oshiro (Leeward CC) is a co-presenter with Andrea Scott (Salt Lake CC) on a session titled, "Where's the Good Stuff: Exploring and Curating EDI Tools and Resource," at the virtual OpenEd Conference on November 7, 2023.

Wayde Oshiro (Leeward CC) is a panel member with Amy Hofer (Open Oregon) and Chealsye Bowley (Colorado Dept. of Higher Ed.) for the session, "Scaling Up OER Initiatives to a State Level," at the Teach and Learn with OER Virtual Symposium for Utah Higher Education on March 27, 2024.

Sheryl Shook (Kapiʻolani CC) and Leanne Urasaki (Hawaiʻi CC) join Sunny Pai (Kapiʻolani CC) and Wayde Oshiro (Leeward CC) as UHCC OER Project Leads.

Sheryl Shook, Sunny Pai, and Wayde Oshiro attend the 3rd WICHE OERwest Convening in Henderson, Nevada on April 23-24, 2024.

UHCC OER initiative website debuts in August 2022.

Year 2 of the UHCC OER Incentive Program. Fourteen UHCC instructors completed the asynchronous OER 101 online course. Nine instructors submit written reviews of textbooks in the Open Textbook Library.

A total of $37,971 is awarded to three OER modification projects and five OER creation projects by ten faculty from Hawaiʻi CC, Honolulu CC, Kapiʻolani CC, and Leeward CC.

Daniela Dutra Elliott (Leeward CC) and Jason Yamashita (Leeward CC) were OEN Publishing Cooperative Advisory Group members in 2023.

Leanne Urasaki (Hawaiʻi CC) participated in the OEN course on open pedagogy, Open Education Network Learning Circle on Open Pedagogy. 

Seven OER sessions are presented at the Hawaiʻi Student Success Institute on March 3, 2023. 

A HISSI pre-conference OER workshop was held at Leeward CC on March 2, 2023, focusing on Open Pedagogy. This workshop was facilitated by Karen Cangiolosi, Open Education Global Director of Membership and RLOE Program Director, and Rebecca Ortiz, Psychology Professor at Santa Ana College. A second workshop on open textbook publishing using UH Pressbooks was facilitated by Billy Meinke, OER Technologist at Outreach College. Twenty-five instructors from seven UHCC campuses attended.

UHCC OER and HISSI are featured on the OE Global website.

UHCC OER participates in the Open Education Network Manifold Pilot Project, a two-year project to explore the Manifold web publishing platform for OER creation and sharing. Leanne Urasaki (Hawaiʻi CC) led the UHCC team’s project to convert the UHCC OER asynchronous OER 101 training course from its location in Laulima to an openly accessible digital textbook for broader use. UHCC is one of seventeen institutions selected to participate in the project. 

Librarians Carina Chernisky (UHWO), Soledad Lencinas (UHWO), Beth Tillinghast (UHM, retired), Junie Hayashi (Leeward CC), and Jason Yamashita (Leeward CC) are published in the DOERS3 publication, Valuing OER in the Tenure, Promotion, and Reappointment Process, Case Study 13: Supporting OER in Tenure and Promotion Documentation: Lessons from the University of Hawaiʻi. 

UHCC OER collaborates with UH OER and IRAPO to generate TXT0 reports three times a year. The report automates a previously manual process to compile TXT0 classes and cost savings for each campus.

Wayde Oshiro (Leeward CC) and Sunny Pai (Kapiʻolani CC) presented on course marking at WICHEʻs (Western Interstate Commission for Higher Education) OERWest annual meeting in April 2023. Also at this meeting, Wayde participated in a session with Andrea Scott (Salt Lake CC) and Lisa Young (Maricopa CCD) on evaluating OER programs. 

Sunny Pai (Kapiʻolani CC) volunteered on the CCCOER OER Research & Impact Committee in 2022-2023. 

Wayde Oshiro (Leeward CC) served as the co-chair of CCCOERʻs (Community College Consortium on OER) EDI Committee and as an instructor/mentor for the OEN (Open Education Network) OER Certificate in Librarianship Program (2020-2023). 

Sunny Pai (Kapiʻolani CC), UHCC OER Team Co-lead, is a panelist for the New England Board of Higher Education's Course Marking: Lessons Learned from the Field webinar on June 14, 2023.

Sunny Pai (Kapiʻolani CC)  presented on course marking at CCCOER’s Summer Conversation on Course Marking for Research on Impact in August 2023. 

A UH System-sponsored ten-campus book sprint led by Sheryl Shook (Kapi’olani CC) is poised to release PHYL 141 and PHYL 142 across the ten campuses. Kapi’olani CC provides instructional design, course template design, and librarian support. 

In Spring 2023, 1,120 UHCC course sections, representing 34.5% of all sections, are designated TXT0. Total enrollment in TXT0 courses is 17,456.

Estimated textbook cost savings to students in 2022-23 is $4,134,000. Cumulative textbook savings since 2016 is $21,220,000.

UHCC OER launches OER 101, an asynchronous online course for instructors. Thirty-seven instructors representing six UHCC campuses complete the synchronous and asynchronous versions of the course.

Twenty-two UHCC instructors submit written reviews of textbooks in the Open Textbook Library.

A total of $21,500 is awarded to eight OER modification and creation projects with fifteen faculty participants. 

Ashley Biddle (Leeward CC) was selected as an Open Education Research Group Fellowship member.

Botany in Hawaiʻi at textbook by Daniela Dutra Elliott (Leeward CC) and Paula Mejia Velasquez (Leeward CC) is the 1,000th textbook accepted into the Open Textbook Library. Learn about the author's journey here.

• Estimated textbook cost savings to students in 2021-22 is $4,578,600. Cumulative textbook savings since 2016 is $17,086,000.

Two Open Textbook Reviewer workshops are attended by 40 participants. Twenty-six faculty submit reviews of open textbooks in the Open Textbook Library.

Summer 2021 virtual workshops: Why OER: An Introduction to Open Educational Resources and Adapting OER in Support of Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion. 

Kapiʻolani CC faculty member and OER campus co-lead Sheryl Shook serves as the project lead for PHYL 141/142 textbook creation project for the ten-campus UH System.

Junie Hayashi (Leeward CC) presented with Carina Chernisky (UHWO), the poster, Embracing Virtual Spaces: OER Trainings in the COVID-19 Era, at ACRL 2021. 

All UHCC campuses use the TXT0 attribute to mark zero textbook cost classes.

Over 30% of total UHCC class sections are TXT0. 

Estimated student cost savings in 2020-21 is $3,850,900. Cumulative savings since 2016 is $12,507,048. 

The UHCC OER Team holds a day-long strategic planning meeting at Leeward CC to improve coordination of activities and to standardize practices for data collection and reporting.

UHCC sends a team of 10 faculty to the Open Ed 2019 Conference in Phoenix, Arizona. The UHCC OER co-leads attend an invitation-only Regional Leaders in Open Education meeting that precedes the conference.

Hawaiʻi CC funds incentive awards for creation projects for BIOL 171L, BIOL 275L, FAMR 230, MICR 140L, PHYL 141L. 

Book sprints that included UHCC instructors were held at UH Manoa. Two copy edited texts for ENG 100 and ECON 130 were produced. 

The UHCC OER Team develops an OER track for the 2020 Hawaiʻi Student Success Institute conference with two invited speakers from BCcampus and LibreTexts.

First LibreFest held by LibreTexts on the Leeward CC campus. A hands-on workshop to learn how to develop textbooks using the LibreTexts platform.

Leeward CC offers a virtual Go Open, Go Free Using OER workshop for the first time due to the COVID-19 pandemic. To date, the in-person and virtual Go Open, Go Free workshops have been completed by 90 faculty from all the UHCC campuses, UH Hilo, and UH West Oʻahu.

A TXT0 Banner attribute is implemented by the UH System. UHCC campuses using Textbook Cost: $0 begin using the new TXT0 attribute. 

Hawaiʻi CC and Windward CC begin to mark courses using the TXT0 attribute.

The UHCC OER Team develops an OER track for the 2019 Hawaiʻi Student Success Institute conference. The program includes three national and international OER experts as speakers.

Hawaiʻi CC offers an OER Professional Development Training program for faculty. 

Leanne Urasaki and Melanie Wilson (Hawaiʻi CC) participated in the Creative Commons Certificate Course for Educators.

Kapiʻolani CC has open textbook creation projects in development for COM 201, ICS 141, Math 75X, and PHYL 142L.

Kauai CC funds incentive awards for faculty teaching History, Mathematics, Hawaiian Studies, English, Marine Science, Marine Biology, Biology, Physics, Marketing, and Music.

Leeward CC offers the following workshops: Open Textbook Reviewer, Go Open, Go Free Using OER, and Create and Share OER Renewable Resources. Leeward also coordinates a workshop by Delmar Larsen from LibreTexts.

UH Maui College's OER Ambassador Program launches.

• The OVPCC funds OER activities for all 7 UHCC campuses. A UHCC OER Team is established with representatives from each campus.

• Campuses organize faculty development workshops and incentive programs.

• The UHCC System joins the Open Textbook Network as a consortial member. A train-the-trainer workshop is held that is attended by 27 faculty from 7 campuses.

• UHCC joins CCCOER, the Community College Consortium for Open Educational Resources.

• UHCC sends its first team to the Open Textbook Network Summer Institute in Minnesota.

• Honolulu CC starts using the Textbook Cost: $0 course note for the first time in Fall 2016.

• 1,046 Textbook Cost: $0 classes at Honolulu, Kapiʻolani, and Leeward campuses.

• Estimated student cost savings in 2016-17 for the three campuses is $1,698,000.

• Leeward CC and Kapiʻolani CC start implementing the Textbook Cost: $0 course note in Banner.

• Project and campus leads attended the Open Education Conference in Vancouver, Canada, November 2015

• OER C4ward conducted at Kapiʻolani CC Fall 2015 and will be held Spring 2016

• OER Professional Development (flipped workshop series) held at Leeward CC in Spring 2016

• OER Professional Development (in-person) held at both Leeward CC & Kapiʻolani CC in Summer 2016.

• Kapiʻolani and Leeward CC explore OER as a solution to high textbook costs.

• Teams from both campuses attend the 2014 Open Education Conference in Arlington, Virginia.

• Leeward hosts the first Go Open, Go Free Using OER one-week professional learning workshop with 14 UHCC faculty attending.

• The Office of the Vice President for Community Colleges (OVPCC) funds OER pilot programs at Kapiʻolani and Leeward.

• The Textbook Cost: $0 course note is applied for the first time to select Fall 2015 classes at Leeward with zero textbook costs.

• Textbook Cost: $0 for Spring 2016: 76 classes at Kapiʻolani and 150 classes at Leeward.

• Estimated student cost savings to date: $1,342,000

• OER Fellowship Program launched at Kapiʻolani and Leeward. Incentive award programs are also established at both campuses.