Affordable Learning Opportunities reduce costs for students by substituting low-cost or no-cost resources in place of commercial textbooks. The scope of material used can be wider than Open Educational Resources (OER).
Open Educational Resources (OER) are teaching, learning, and research materials that are either (a) in the public domain or (b) licensed in a manner that provides everyone with free and perpetual permission to engage in the 5R activities - retaining, remixing, revising, reusing and redistributing the resources. This can be anything from a single lesson plan to an entire textbook.
Mason OER Metafinder (MOM)Simultaneously search 22 OER repositories.
Use Advanced Search if you want to select specific repositories to search, such as OER Commons and Open Textbook Library. Enter search terms into at least 1 field. All fields are not required.
The text covers all areas and ideas of the subject appropriately and provides an effective index and/or glossary.
Content is accurate, error-free and unbiased.
Content is up-to-date, but not in a way that will quickly make the text obsolete within a short period of time. The text is written and/or arranged in such a way that necessary updates will be relatively easy and straightforward to implement.
The text is written in lucid, accessible prose, and provides adequate context for any jargon/technical terminology used.
The text is internally consistent in terms of terminology and framework.
The text is easily and readily divisible into smaller reading sections that can be assigned at different points within the course (i.e., enormous blocks of text without subheadings should be avoided). The text should not be overly self-referential, and should be easily reorganized and realigned with various sub-units of a course without presenting much disruption to the reader.
The topics in the text are presented in a logical, clear fashion.
The text is free of significant interface issues, including navigation problems, distortion of images/charts, and any other display features that may distract or confuse the reader.
The text contains no grammatical or spelling errors.
The text reflects diversity and inclusion regarding culture, gender, ethnicity, national origin, age, disability, sexual orientation, education, religion. It does not include insensitive or offensive language in these areas.
This rubric was developed by BCcampus. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license.
Do you need help locating OER for your classes? Lander Librarians can assist you with locating OER. Email us to set up a time for a consultation: library@lander.edu
Partnership Among South Carolina Academic Libraries (PASCAL) has launched an affordable learning initiative called South Carolina Affordable Learning (SCALE). Jackson Library is teaming up with them to help cut higher education costs for our students by helping you to find and adopt affordable course materials. Learn more about SCALE's programs and resources.
