Affordable Course Materials
Ohio Libraries is committed to providing and promoting affordable learning materials for OHIO students. Through our library collections, course reserves, Zero Cost Textbook Program, and promotion of OER the Library has many ways for faculty to help students save money on course materials.
Research shows that students with financial needs sometimes forego purchasing required course materials even though they know it will impact their grades (Student PIRGs. (2021). Fixing the Broken Textbook Market, 3rd ed).
There are multiple ways to make learning more affordable for students. We are happy to partner with you to discover and create no-cost course materials for your students. Use these strategies to make your course materials as affordable as possible. Check out the strategies below or contact John Canter, Chris Guder, or Haley Shaw to get started.
Zero Cost Textbook Initiative
Pending ZCT Initiative Info
Making Traditional Textbooks Affordable
Place a physical copy of the textbook on course reserve in any of our libraries.
- This can be your copy or a library copy (if we own it).
- We also have other items that students need outside of class, like bone models, microscopes and slides, DVDs, music CDs, and more.
Let students know which older editions they can use.
- Let students know in your syllabus how to navigate assigned readings using older editions that still meet your learning goals (e.g. use chapter headings if page numbers are different).
If using portions of books, we can scan those and make them electronically available.
- Choose the Libraries’ course reserve system or Learning Management System to host the scans.
Library Provided Materials
Link to the Libraries’ electronic articles, newspapers, books, and movies.
- Ask your librarian for help locating digital content of all kinds.
- Add all kinds of library content to Canvas.
- Let us help you streamline your syllabus and maximize access to your course readings
Choose a book that is available electronically from the Libraries.
- Ask your librarian about limits on simultaneous logins to our e-books.
Open Education Resources (OER) & Open Textbooks
Adopt an Open Educational Resource (OER) or open textbook.
- High-quality OERs are increasingly available.
- OERs are free to readers and allow you to customize the content to suit your course needs.
- Ask your librarian for help.
Adapt an existing open textbook or OER to your needs or create your own!
- This is often done in conjunction of course design or re-design – reach out to the Office of Instructional Innovation for assistance with course design.
- Consider the OHIO Open Library as a place to host your open content.
Understand Open Educational Resources (OER) and Open Textbooks
- The Rebus Guide to Publishing Open Textbooks (So Far)
- OER Toolkit from the Colleges Libraries Ontario (CLO), provides information for instructors to help "understand, engage with, and sustain OER in their work and practice."
- More on Open Education from SPARC
Find Open Textbooks and OER with these Discovery Tools
- Examine the OER materials from the Ohio Open Ed Collaborative
- OASIS (Openly Available Sources Integrated Search) includes the ability to limit search results by license, type, subject, source, and reviews available.
- Mason OER Metafinder searches sixteen collections of open resources in real-time, returning the top several hundred or so relevant hits from each site.
- COOL4Ed Find Free and Open eTextbooks offers California State University's curated lists by discipline of open textbooks from Merlot and other sources
- Open Professionals Education Network links to discovery tools for open textbooks, photos, video, audio, and more.
- Open Textbook Library is a growing catalog of free, peer-reviewed, and openly-licensed textbooks.
- MERLOT II a searchable database of tens of thousands of discipline-specific learning materials, learning exercises, and Content Builder web pages, together with associated comments, and bookmark collections.
- Open Stax College includes open textbooks for high enrollment college courses using the Connexions platform.
- Open Educational Resources (OER) Commons – open teaching and learning materials including full university courses, interactive mini-lessons, simulations, and electronic textbooks.
- Open Course Library – Textbooks, syllabi, assessments for 81 high-enrollment college courses created by a Washington State Board for Community & Technical Colleges (SBCTC) grant.
- Teaching Commons – Curated by librarians and their institutions, the Teaching Commons includes high-quality open educational resources such as textbooks, course materials, lesson plans, multimedia, and more. Discover content by type of work or subject.
- Open Book Publishers – a scholar operation committed to making high-quality research available to readers around the world, including a growing collection of monographs and textbooks in all areas.
Make Your Own Content Open
- Considering joining a community of instructors creating their own content: Rebus Community Forum
- The Rebus Guide to Publishing Open Textbooks (So Far)
- Consider letting us host your open textbook or other open content at the OHIO Open Library
- Creating, Editing & Hosting OER: Kirkwood’s Community College’s excellent guide to helpful tools.
- Jhangiani R. and Biswas-Diener, R., eds. (2017). Open: The Philosophy and Practices that are Revolutionizing Education and Science. London: Ubiquity Press.
- Falldin, M. and Lauritsen, K. (2017). Authoring Open Textbooks. Minneapolis, MN: Open Textbook Network – Includes a checklist of considerations and sections on copyright, Creative Commons licenses, textbook organization, authoring frameworks, and publishing tools.
- Moxley, J. (Sept – Oct, 2013). Open textbook publishing. Academe. – the story of one instructor’s decision to create an open textbook.