Textbooks are often expensive, costing between $50 – $150 on average. The high cost of textbooks often causes students to hesitate in buying them, which negatively impacts 麻豆直播鈥檚 most vulnerable student populations who turn to the Library for access.
However, providing reliable access from the Library can be difficult even in the age of ebooks, with restrictive terms imposed by publishers sometimes preventing students from accessing their required texts easily. Picture having to wait until midnight when the other three ebook users have finally logged out so you can read your textbook online. Or maybe you鈥檙e only able to download a couple of chapters of a textbook, not the whole book. Using published textbooks can be a frustrating experience for students.
Open Educational Resources (OERs) are one way to address this issue. They are a great alternative to published textbooks as they are online resources that can be accessed, adapted and redistributed with no or limited restrictions. For example, case studies and examples can be changed to be more relevant and the order that topics are presented can be adjusted to best suit the unit鈥檚 calendar.
The Council of Australian University Librarians (CAUL) has run the Open Educational Resources Collective since 2022 to encourage the publication of OERs in Australia. Books produced with the assistance of the program undergo the same stringent peer-review and editorial processes as traditionally published textbooks, and provide examples and case studies relevant to the Australian context. To date, the program has , with more to come.
The books published by the collective above, as well as many more, are available from our – just search for 鈥淥pen Educational Resources Collective鈥� or filter your search by 鈥淥pen Access鈥� and 鈥淏ooks鈥� and keep an eye out for licensing information. The is also a great source with over 5,000 open textbooks published. For a list of other sources, visit our Open textbooks page and look for the section 鈥楩ind Open Education Resources鈥�.
The concept of openly licensing teaching, learning and research materials is exploding across the world so it鈥檚 a good time to jump on board and consider adapting an OER for a unit you are teaching or, as a student, provide feedback to your unit coordinator and suggest an OER for future students.
If you鈥檙e interested in learning more, get in touch with us at Library-UniSkills@curtin.edu.au.
