WPI OER Initiative

Imagining a More Accessible, Inclusive WPI Education

In Spring 2021, a team was selected by AAC&U from WPI through a competitive national process to focus on Open Educational Resources (OERs). The team, comprised of academic staff and faculty with experience and investment in OERs, are working together to create a comprehensive university-wide strategy for the adoption, curation, sharing, and creation of resources. Our goal is to create a one-stop resource for information on OERs, examples from the WPI community of creative OER usage, and a blog to alert community members to new opportunities, funding, events, and other relevant OER news.

What is an OER?

Open Education Resources are: teaching, learning, and research materials in any medium – digital or otherwise – that reside in the public domain or have been released under an open license that permits no-cost access, use, adaptation, and redistribution by others with no or limited restrictions (UNESCO definition).

There are a large number of formats for OERs like case studies, data sets, lesson plans, study guides, lecture notes, labs, activities, textbooks, illustrations, modules, etc.

There are also many reasons why one may want to use or create OERs in their courses: reduce costs for students, keep up to date, inspiration, diversify materials, promote co-creation of materials with students, supplement existing materials, professional development, etc.

Does this sound like something that will benefit your teaching/learning? Join us! Follow this page for events, information, and opportunities as they arise. To share you own OER work, request a consultancy, or just to connect, email us at: gr-oer@wpi.edu.