WICHE OERWest State Subgrant

In 2025, the UH OER Strategic Advisory Team received an OER State Subgrant to support the scaling of OER at the University of Hawaiʻi. 

The funding supported the first UH Systemwide OER Convening, held at the Hamilton Library at UH Manoa on February 27, 2026. The agenda included OER/TXT0 data mapping and futurecasting activities. A total of 20 participants attended, including OER leads and supporters from 7 campuses, as well as special guests from the UH and UHM Systems and IRAPO. A follow-up convening at Leeward CC was held on May 27, 2026, for OER leads with participants representing 7 campuses. 

Outcomes included new textbook affordability dashboards that visualize TXT0 (Textbook Cost $0) and IDAP (low-cost publisher program) course markings , giving project and campus leads a view of campus adoptions at the discipline, course, and instructor levels, opportunities for administrative support; strategies for responding to emerging equitable access program discussions, and discussing potential collaborative projects and partnerships.

Grant award: $4,565

Open 4 Peer Review Project

Leeward CC is a sub-award participant in a three-year US Department of Education Open Textbook Pilot Grant project titled Open 4 Peer Review. The main sponsor of the grant is Scottsdale Community College and the Maricopa County Community College District. Other participating institutions include Salt Lake Community College, Mesa Community College, Phoenix College, MIT, Arizona State University, Carnegie Mellon University, and the American Association of Colleges & Universities. View project summary.

The goal of the Open 4 Peer Review project and sub-award is to support the development and use of openly-licensed standards and rubrics that address the lack of qualitative indicators and peer review for Open Educational Resources (OER), which has been a barrier to faculty use of OER (Hirsch, 2016; Yuan, 2015, Ehlers, 2015, Freeman, et al., 2022). 

In 2025, the project leadership team, in partnership with AAC&U, developed six single-point rubrics for Accessibility, Copy Editing, Copyright, Disciplinary Appropriateness, eLearning, and Universal Design for Learning. See the project website for the draft rubrics.

Seven faculty members from three campuses (Leeward CC, Kapiʻolani CC, and Windward CC) were recruited in Spring 2026 to peer review 3 OERs contributed by UHCC authors. The reviewers received an assignment to review one of the OERs using one or more rubrics. The reviews were completed and submitted to the project team in June 2026. Each reviewer was compensated $650-$1,000 per review.

The peer reviewer's feedback was shared with the authors, and they agreed to revise their OERs in response. The revised OERs will then be used in their classes in either Fall 2026 or Spring 2027. Authors will be compensated $2,400-$4,000 for the textbook revision. 

Grant award: $45,000

Mentor-Mentee Framework

A collaboration between the UHCC and UH OER teams, the Mentor-Mentee Framework project nurtures relationships between mentors with experiences in OER work and mentees who are looking for guidance with OER learning, OER development, or incorporating OER into tenure and promotion review dossiers. This framework has two components. The OER Mentor Directory offers a public listing of UH OER champions who may be contacted for quick questions or short-term assistance on self-identified topics. The Mentor-Mentee Program nurtures a mentor-mentee partnership for OER-related support through a mentorship contract outlining specific expectations for both parties. 

UHCC members on the development team are Sarah Gray (Windward CC) and Jason Yamashita (Leeward CC).

The OER Mentor Directory will be available in mid-2023.