Work With Us
What are Open Educational Resources?
Open Education Resources (OER) can be any type of educational material: their scale varies from something as small as a class handout or image to something as large as a textbook or online course. While traditional course resources come with restrictive copyright laws, OER use open copyright licenses like Creative Commons. Depending on the creator’s desires, these licenses allow for different degrees of openness. Open educational resources, like open textbooks, can decrease the cost of education because they are either free or low cost (OER Student Toolkit).
OERs are not restricted to textbooks. They can include:
Videos
Audio
Presentation slides
Supplementary materials such as H5P activities, quizzes, etc.
Work With Us
Are you thinking about developing, adapting or remixing an OER(s)? If you need help, tap into the resources of Centennial's new OER Lab. The OER Lab is open to all faculty across the College. Once your OER project is accepted by the Lab, you will become the lead for your project and liaise between the OER Lab staff and any other college staff participating in your project.
Projects* can range from:
Adoption of an existing OER: make minor revisions to customize an open text or other open learning resource you would like to adopt
Modification: take an existing OER and make substantial revisions to better suit course learning outcomes
Build: create a learning resource in any category or format (e.g. textbook, video series, question or test banks)
Ancillaries: create ancillary resources for an existing OER (e.g. H5P activities, test banks)
Other supports such as multimedia creation
*All products developed in collaboration with the OER Lab will be shared with an open licence
Click on the headings below to learn more.
What will be my role as a project lead?
All project leads involved in the project will be asked to commit to the following:
Have a well developed idea of what their OER project will be prior to working with the OER Lab, and have a project that can be completed within 1 - 2 semesters
Develop content for OER and/or identify OERs to be remixed/adapted, on a timely and ongoing basis as required
Ensure that any materials to be used, adapted or remixed that are not their original work(s) have appropriate open licences
Participate in project planning in conjunction with OER Lab staff
Communicate with OER Lab staff on a prompt and ongoing basis
Meet OER Lab staff as necessary
Identify opportunities for further multimedia production (e.g. videos, H5P activities, practice problems/exercises, etc.) to support the new/adapted OER, where appropriate
Liaise between the OER Lab staff and any other college staff participating in the project
What is the time commitment in working with the OER Lab?
The time commitment is based on the scope of your project. However, we ask that, at minimum, you be able to:
Meet with the OER Lab Leads to form an initial project plan
Meet with the OER Lab Leads and/or students on as required to ensure we are meeting the requirements of your project
Gather and/or develop materials for your OER as necessary on a timely basis
We encourage all applicants to share their interest in working with the OER Lab with their manager, discuss estimated time commitment and gain approval prior to applying. The project will require time to complete and may affect workload. Managers of all OER Lab applicants are encouraged to support their endeavors and recognize the valuable contribution these projects will have on increasing access to learning materials for our students.
Faculty Release Time/Compensation
Full-time faculty whose projects are selected for the Lab can receive up to 6.51 complementary hours (established equivalency standard for a 3-hour course release) for the semester in which they are undertaking their research (Fall and/or Winter). Contract faculty can receive up to three hours a week for Fall and/or Winter semester at the non-teaching rate, which will be reflected on their paystub.
For large projects, a stipend may be available to hire one of your students on a part-time basis to assist you with discipline-specific content (e.g. fact-checking, research, content development, etc.).
How will projects be selected?
Our OER Lab is just getting started. Our initial intake will be based on the following:
Feasibility of completing project within proposed timeframe using available resources
Fit within a mix of projects that maximize experiential learning opportunities for the students within our OER Lab
Overall student impact (e.g. number of students who can access the resource, cost reduction, etc.)
Faculty preparedness prior to beginning their work with OER Lab
Submit Your Proposal
If you have an OER project that you'd like our Lab to support you with, submit a proposal to our OER Lab by filling out this form to express your interest in working with us.