Open Educational Resources are teaching, learning and research materials in any medium – digital or otherwise – that reside in the public domain or have been released under an open license that permits no-cost access, use, adaptation and redistribution by others with no or limited restrictions. [1]
According to SPARC:
The key distinguishing characteristic of OER is its intellectual property license and the freedoms the license grants to others to share and adapt it. If a lesson plan or activity is not clearly tagged or marked as being in the public domain or having an open license, it is not OER.[2]
[1] Definition from the Hewlett Foundation
[2] Adapted from SPARC Open Education
There are different degrees of OPEN and it's important to understand the basic tenets of each. All open educational resources (OER) are open access (OA), but not all OA materials are OER.
Always check the licensing applied to any resource that you have found before you use it.
This LibGuide was created by Angela Davis, Instruction and Web Services Librarian, as part of professional development sessions held for the faculty of Pitt Community College on September 26 & 27, 2018.
Unless otherwise noted, OER: Open Educational Resources by Pitt Community College Library is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.