Learn more about how you can support the adoption and development of high-quality open courses and educational resources by checking out the following resources on grants, OER advocacy, and other OER guidelines. The rest of our series on Open Educational Resources (OER) features collections of open courses, textbooks, and course content that you may use, re-purpose, and distribute for your teaching and learning needs.
Part 1: Course Content and Textbooks | Part 2: Open Courses and MOOCs | Part 4: K-12 Resources | Part 5: Articles and Research
Grants
The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation (http://www.hewlett.org/programs/education/open-educational-resources)
The Hewlett Foundation is a private foundation based in California that awards grants to a variety of causes. The Foundation has grantmaking programs in education, the environment, global development and population, the performing arts, and philanthropy. Since 2002, the Hewlett Foundation has worked with OER grantees to improve education globally by making high-quality academic materials openly available on the Internet. For more information about the Foundation’s support of OER, read the Education Program’s strategic plan:
http://www.hewlett.org/uploads/documents/Education_Strategic_Plan_2010.pdf
OER Advocacy
Open Education Consortium (http://www.oeconsortium.org/)
The Open Education Consortium is a global community of hundreds of higher education institutions and associated organizations committed to advancing open education and its impact on global education. In addition to offering a database of open educational resources, the OEC also organizes events, webinars, and other projects to advocate for open education.
OpenVA (http://openva.org/)
Building OpenVA is an annual one-day event designed to bring together educators, administrators, technologists, and policy makers from around Virginia to collaborate on developing a framework for higher education institutions to more effectively share educational infrastructure and resources.
OER Guidelines
OER Handbook (http://wikieducator.org/OER_Handbook/educator/Style_guide)
The purpose of this handbook is to provide a guide for those who are just getting started in the creation of open educational resources (OER). The OER Handbook features three mini-books for educators, institutions, and policy makers. The OER Handbook is guided by the Center for Open and Sustainable Learning(COSL) and generously funded by the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation.