Early Bird

OER grant winners announced

Five MSU Denver faculty members will use the Auraria Library Open Education Grant to develop no-cost resources.

By Ellen Metter

January 14, 2020

Five Metropolitan State University of Denver faculty members have received $1,200 Auraria Library Open Education Grants to support their development of no-cost Open Educational Resources. The tri-institutional grant program aims to inspire instructors to choose OER and no-cost resources over expensive course materials, lowering costs and broadening opportunities for students. The grantees will develop openly licensed and public-domain materials with no restrictions on reuse and adaption for use on campus and, hopefully, beyond.

Jade Hoyer, assistant professor of Art and Printmaking Area coordinator, and artist Catherine Nelson will create openly licensed classroom aid posters and easy-to-use printmaking guides for studio use in a beginning printmaking course covering intaglio and relief techniques. The guides will employ a simple and playful visual layout for improved readability compared with traditional, verbally dense textbooks.  

Robert Niemayer, Ph.D., assistant professor, Mathematics, will replace a Calculus III textbook and proprietary online homework system with an open textbook, a freely available homework-submission platform and self-authored, multimodal supplementary materials. Students will also use a no-cost Wiki-style forum where they can work through problems collaboratively. Materials created for this course will eventually become part of a calculus-series open textbook.

Alycia Palmer, Ph.D., instructor, Analytical Chemistry Laboratory, will develop openly licensed lab procedures for multiple physical chemistry experiments, eliminating the need for a traditionally published textbook in two laboratory courses. These procedures will fill a gap in open resources and will be published and updated for the benefit of the national chemistry community. 

Shelley Poole, Ph.D., associate professor, Applied Mathematics, will pilot the use of open textbooks, a free online homework system and self-authored supplementary materials in place of traditional textbooks and a proprietary online homework system in calculus-series courses. Resources created for this project will be available to other math faculty interested in OER adoption. 

Salina Siddique, Ph.D., assistant professor, Accounting, will develop online homework and test banks as a supplement to an open accounting textbook. The creation of these resources will provide an opportunity to add more culturally inclusive content and integrate CPA test-preparation elements. These resources will be available to other accounting faculty to facilitate the adoption of an open text. 

Community College of Denver grantees include Amanda O’Sullivan, Melissa Randall and Kelly Zepp. University of Colorado Denver recipients are Sandy Zook, Lindsey Hamilton and collaborators Maria Delgado, Jo VandenBurg and Phil Gallegos.

Educators who are already using OER also are invited to report their work and be recognized for their leadership.

Learn more about OER and consider setting up a consultation time with Auraria Library staff to discuss OER possibilities for your course.