Want to lower educational costs? Campus-level initiatives take real planning, challenge mitigation, and lots of heart. Implementing large scale OER initiatives can be a solution to today's educational challenges and is achievable through thoughtful design, consistent communication, and progress monitoring. The Hewlett HBCU AL$ project can show you how.
An OER Mindset is the belief that education should be available for all who may be interested and that the skills required can be attained and practiced for the greater good. Building a campus wide OER Mindset requires systemic approaches to lowering educational costs through the use and reuse of open curricula across disciplines and sectors. We know that adopting, implementing, and sustaining large-scale cultural refinement such as this takes real planning, risk management, and emotional intelligence from higher education leaders and faculty alike.
There is no doubt that cultural refinement is big work, but the HBCU Affordable Learning $olutions pilot project is demonstrating how large scale OER initiatives designed to support project teams across numerous states can be achieved through thoughtful and strategic planning, communication, and implementation. Generously funded through the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, the HBCU Affordable Learning $olutions pilot project was strategically created to lay a foundation for successful OER Mindset development across partner and affiliate universities. Intentional use and reuse of open educational resources at the campus level can be a solution in providing opportunities for lowering costs, increasing student access to programming, and ensuring better availability of quality learning materials. From nurturing early adopters to expanding efforts campus wide, this session will share the OER Mindset philosophy and demonstrate its efficacy through project management tools, communication methods, and strategic systems designed to support project teams across numerous states. Through an investigation of measurable results, attendees will learn about the foundational thinking and planning required to reduce costs for students and increase enrollment for institutions that lead to stronger populations of college graduates and workforce candidates.