The document reviews research on the perceptions and efficacy of Open Educational Resources (OER), highlighting a survey indicating that most faculty are unaware of OER. It suggests increased marketing and peer-reviewed studies to improve faculty understanding and perceptions of OER materials. Additionally, it discusses findings from the Kaleidoscope Open Course Initiative, which showed that OER can maintain educational quality while significantly reducing student costs.

1. A REVIEW OF RESEARCH ON THE
PERCEPTIONS AND EFFICACY OF
OER (AND A CALL FOR MORE!)
John Hilton III
http://johnhiltoniii.org
Open Education Group
http://openedgroup.org

2. PROBLEM
A recent nationally representative survey of
2,144 faculty members in the United States
found that “most faculty remain unaware of
OER.”
 Source: Babson 2014 Survey, “Opening theCurriculum.”

3. POSSIBLE SOLUTIONS
Increasing efforts to “market” OER.
Increasing number of outstanding OER material.
Increasing the number of academic, peer-reviewed
studies regarding the efficacy and teacher and student
perceptions of OER materials.

4. INCREASINGTHE NUMBER OF ACADEMIC, PEER-REVIEWED
STUDIES REGARDINGTHE EFFICACY ANDTEACHER AND
STUDENT PERCEPTIONS OF OER MATERIALS.
The Babson 2014 survey found that college professors rate
“proven efficacy” and “trusted quality” as the number 1
and number 2 most important criteria for selecting
teaching resources.

5. PUBLISHED EFFICACY AND PERCEPTION
STUDIES
1. Article focused on efficacy or perception in actual practice (not
simply theory).
2. The resource(s) examined in the study needed to be OER that
were the primary learning resource(s) used in the class.
3. In order to be selected for inclusion in this study, the research
needed to have been published by a peer-reviewed journal, or be
an institutional research report. Blog posts and conference
proceedings were excluded from this data set.

6. THE BIG PICTURE
Across Eight Different
Academic Studies 3594
Students and Professors
Were Surveyed…

7. THE BIG PICTURE
*Photo of students courtesy of http://acreelman.blogspot.com/2014_09_01_archive.html

8. REFERENCES - ONLINE SUMMARY:
HTTP://OPENEDGROUP.ORG/REVIEW
1. Allen, G., Guzman-Alvarez, A., Molinaro, M., Larsen, D. (2015). Assessing the Impact and Efficacy of the Open-Access ChemWiki Textbook Project. Educause Learning Initiative Brief, January 2015. See also this newsletter.
2. Allen, I., Seaman, J. (2014). Opening the Curriculum: Open Educational Resources in U.S. Higher Education, 2014.
3. Bliss, T., Robinson, T. J., Hilton, J., & Wiley, D. (2013). An OER COUP: College teacher and student perceptions of Open Educational Resources. Journal of Interactive Media in Education, 1–25.
4. Bliss, T., Hilton, J., Wiley, D., Thanos, K. (2013). The cost and quality of open textbooks: Perceptions of community college faculty and students. First Monday, 18:1.
5. Bowen, W. G., Chingos, M. M., Lack, K. A., & Nygren, T. I. (2012). Interactive Learning Online at Public Universities: Evidence from Randomized Trials. Ithaka S+R.
6. Bowen, W. G., Chingos, M. M., Lack, K. A., & Nygren, T. I. (2014). Interactive Learning Online at Public Universities: Evidence from a Six‐Campus Randomized Trial. Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, 33(1), 94-111.
7. Feldstein, A., Martin, M., Hudson, A., Warren, K., Hilton, J., & Wiley, D. (2012). Open textbooks and increased student access and outcomes. European Journal of Open, Distance and E-Learning..
8. Gil, P., Candelas, F., Jara, C., Garcia, G., Torres, F (2013). Web-based OERs in Computer Networks. International Journal of Engineering Education, 29(6), 1537-1550. (OA preprint)
9. Hilton, J., Gaudet, D., Clark, P., Robinson, J., & Wiley, D. (2013). The adoption of open educational resources by one community college math department. The International Review of Research in Open and Distance
Learning, 14(4), 37–50.
10. Hilton, J., & Laman, C. (2012). One college’s use of an open psychology textbook. Open Learning: The Journal of Open and Distance Learning, 27(3), 201–217. (Open Repository Preprint).
11. Lindshield, B., & Adhikari, K. (2013). Online and campus college students like using an open educational resource instead of a traditional textbook. Journal of Online Learning & Teaching,9(1), 1–7.
12. Lovett, M., Meyer, O., & Thille, C. (2008). The open learning initiative: Measuring the effectiveness of the OLI statistics course in accelerating student learning. Journal of Interactive Media in Education, 2008 (1).
13. Pawlyshyn, Braddlee, Casper and Miller (2013). Adopting OER: A Case Study of Cross-Institutional Collaboration and Innovation. Educause Review.
14. Petrides, L., Jimes, C., Middleton‐Detzner, C., Walling, J., & Weiss, S. (2011). Open textbook adoption and use: Implications for teachers and learners. Open learning, 26(1), 39-49.
15. Robinson T. J., Fischer, L., Wiley, D. A., & Hilton, J. (2014). The impact of open textbooks on secondary science learning outcomes. Educational Researcher, 43(7): 341-351.
16. Wiley, D., Hilton, J. Ellington, S., and Hall, T. (2012). “A preliminary examination of the cost savings and learning impacts of using open textbooks in middle and high school science classes.” International Review of Research
in Open and Distance Learning. 13 (3), pp. 261-276.

9. LET’S LOOK AT FOUR OFTHE SIXTEEN
PUBLISHED PERCEPTIONS/EFFICACY STUDIES
Bliss et al., – Perceptions across eight colleges
Hilton et al., – Scottsdale Community College Math
Allen et al., – UC Davis Chemistry
Robinson et al., – Secondary science

10. KALEIDOSCOPE OPEN COURSE INITIATIVE
The study context is an open education initiative called the
Kaleidoscope Open Course Initiative (KOCI) (http://www.project-
kaleidoscope.org/).This initiative was originally comprised of
eight community colleges serving predominantly at-risk
students (this number has now expanded).These colleges work
together to create courses that replace traditional, expensive
textbooks with OER. During the 2011-2012 academic year, KOCI
impacted over 4,000 students across 80 teachers in a controlled
pilot, with another 5,000 students using KOCI course designs
and materials outside the controlled pilot.

11. KOCI –TEACHER PERCEPTIONS
58 teachers from 8 KOCI institutions completed
some items on the questionnaire.
Student preparedness. Most teachers (63%) believed
that their students were equally prepared in the
course with PK texts compared to students in the
same course before implementation of KOCI texts
(Figure 3). At the same time, more than a quarter of
teachers (26%) felt that students were more
prepared than students in the same course in the
past. Only 11 percent perceived students as being
less prepared.

12. KOCITEACHER PERCEPTIONS
58TOTALTEACHERS
26%
63%
11%
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
60%
70%
More Prepared Equally Prepared Less Prepared
Teachers’ Perceptions of student preparedness after
implementation of KOCITexts

13. KOCI–TEACHER PERCEPTIONS
Teacher perceptions of quality. Twenty out of 57
(35%) teachers indicated that they thought the
OER textbook was better than texts they had
used previously to teach the course. Only 6 (11%)
felt the OER texts were worse than traditional
texts.The remaining 31(54%) teachers indicated
that their OER texts were of the nearly the same
quality as other texts they had used in the past.

14. KOCI–TEACHER PERCEPTIONS
57TOTALTEACHERS
35%
54%
11%
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
60%
Better Quality Equal Quality Worse Quality
Teachers’ perceptions of OER text quality compared to
traditional texts

15. KOCI – STUDENT PERCEPTIONS
490 students from all eight KOCI institutions
completed the questionnaire. 60% were female.
39% of students indicated that they thought the
OER textbook was better than texts they had used
in other courses. 6% felt the OER texts were worse
and 55% indicated that their OER texts were of the
nearly the same quality as other texts they had
used in the past.

16. KOCI – STUDENT PERCEPTIONS
490TOTAL STUDENTS
39%
55%
6%
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
60%
Better Quality Equal Quality Worse Quality
Student Perceptions of KOCITexts compared to traditional texts

17. KOCI– STUDENT PERCEPTIONS
160 students provided a description of what they
thought made the OER texts better.Their responses
clustered in six major categories: technical advantages
(8%), learning aides (9%), customization (10%), cost
(20%), access (26%), and quality/presentation (27%).
Conversely, 20 students provided a description of what
they thought made the OER texts worse than other
texts they had used in the past.Their responses
clustered in 2 major categories; six students described
technology issues and 15 students took issue with text
quality.

18. KOCI– STUDENT PERCEPTIONS
SAMPLE SIZES - 160 STUDENTS – BETTER
20 STUDENTS -WORSE
8% 9% 10%
20%
26%
17%
0%
5%
10%
15%
20%
25%
30%
Student descriptions of OER Benefits
6
15
0
2
4
6
8
10
12
14
16
Technology
Issues
Text Quality
Student descriptions of
OER Downsides

19. LET’S LOOK AT FOUR OFTHE SIXTEEN
PUBLISHED PERCEPTIONS/EFFICACY STUDIES
Bliss et al., – Perceptions across eight colleges
Hilton et al., – Scottsdale Community College Math
Allen et al., – UC Davis Chemistry
Robinson et al., – Secondary science

20. Text Book and Interactive
Learning Environment Package
provided by Wiley and Pearson
Education
Intermediate Algebra
1352 Students
Publisher Learning
Resources
Introductory
Algebra
1250 Students
$110.26 per Student
$182,086.76 per Semester
College
Algebra
701 Students
SCC’STRANSITIONTO OER

21. Text Book and Interactive Learning
Environment provided through OER
Introductory
Algebra
1250 Students
College
Algebra
700 Students
Traditional
Copyrighted
Material
Transition
Open
Educational
Resources
Maximum of
$15 per Student
Text Book and Interactive
Learning Environment
provided through OER
86% decrease in costs

22. RESULTS
Percentage of
Students Earning a C
Grade or Better Fall 2010 Fall 2011 Fall 2012
AT 12x 60%
(n=748)
63%
(n=721)
62%
(n=764)
MAT 15x 65%
(n=448)
64%
(n=388)
65%
(n=461)
MAT 182 56%
(n=106)
61%
(n=109)
58% (n=95)
MAT 187 53% (n=72) 48% (n=82) 55% (n=80)

23. RESULTS
Completion
Rates Fall 2010 Fall 2011 Fall 2012
MAT 12x 79% (n=748) 76% (n=721) 75% (n=764)
MAT 15x 73% (n=448) 72% (n=388) 76% (n=461)
MAT 182 58% (n=106) 72% (n=109) 72% (n=95)
MAT 187 68% (n=72) 62% (n=82) 64% (n=80)

24. 12
491
263
105
28 11
0
50
100
150
200
250
300
350
400
450
500
550
No Response Strongly
agree
Slightly agree Neutral Slightly
disagree
Strongly
disagree
Overall, the materials adequately
supported the work I did in class

25. 9
426
285
139
34 17
0
50
100
150
200
250
300
350
400
450
500
550
No Response Strongly
agree
Slightly agree Neutral Slightly
disagree
Strongly
disagree
Overall, the materials adequately
supported the work I did outside of class

26. 26
483
210
133
33 25
0
50
100
150
200
250
300
350
400
450
500
550
No Response Strongly
agree
Slightly agree Neutral Slightly
disagree
Strongly
disagree
I would recommend the use of these
materials to my classmates.

27. “WHAT ADDITIONAL COMMENTS DOYOU HAVE
REGARDINGTHE QUALITY OFTHE OPEN MATERIALS
USED INYOUR CLASS?” (210/255 (82%) POSITIVE)
“They were good. Definitely worth not
having a massed produced book for.”
“I never had an open materials class
before. It made work less stressful and
learning more enjoyable – didn’t
constantly feel frustrated and was able
to look through notes when I got
stuck.”
“The quality was excellent. It really
helped my understanding.”
210
45
0
50
100
150
200
250
Positive Comments Negative Comments
Types of Comments

28. “WHAT ADDITIONAL COMMENTS DOYOU HAVE
REGARDINGTHE QUALITY OFTHE OPEN MATERIALS
USED INYOUR CLASS?” (210/255 (82%) POSITIVE)
“Buying textbooks is out of date and I think
materials should be inexpensive.”
“I love saving money, I am poor.”
“I like the open materials, textbooks are so
expensive that it makes me not want to buy
them.”

29. FACULTY RESPONSES
Of the fifteen instructors
who responded to the
question, “Do you feel
that the OER materials
adequately supported the
work that was completed
INSIDE the classroom?
Why or why not?”
thirteen answered “yes,”
13
2
0
2
4
6
8
10
12
14
Yes No
Did OER materials adequately
support work INSIDE the Classroom?

30. FACULTY RESPONSES
Similarly, of the fifteen instructors who responded to the
question, “Do you feel that the OER materials adequately
supported the work that was completedOUTSIDE the
classroom?Why or why not?” thirteen answered “yes.”
Sample responses are “Yes.These materials provided the
students useful resources” and “Yes. It focused in the lesson
well.”The remaining two responses were “Mostly - often
students had online questions, which were discussed
through MathAS or in class” and “In Math 12x, the online HW
contained questions that were not written in the style of the
workbook questions. Some students had difficulty in
transferring their skills to the online questions.”

31. FACULTY RESPONSE
13
2
0
2
4
6
8
10
12
14
Yes No
Did OER materials adequately support work OUTSIDE of
the Classroom?

32. LET’S LOOK AT FOUR OFTHE SIXTEEN
PUBLISHED PERCEPTIONS/EFFICACY STUDIES
Bliss et al., – Perceptions across eight colleges
Hilton et al., – Scottsdale Community College Math
Allen et al., – UC Davis Chemistry
Robinson et al., – Secondary science

33. STUDY DESCRIPTION
Researcher at UC-Davis designed an experiment in which an
experimental class of 478 students used the OERChemWiki
as its primary textbook, while the control class of 448
utilized a commercial textbook.The two sections were
taught the same semester at back-to-back times using the
same faculty member and teaching assistants. Identical
lectures were used in each section. Students in both sections
were given the same midterm and final exams.

34. STUDY RESULTS
Researchers found no significant differences
between the two groups both with overall
exam results and item-specific questions.
Beginning of the semester pre-tests,
combined with final exams showed no
significant differences in individual learning
gains between the two groups. Student
surveys regarding time spent on the class
found that students in both groups spent
approximately the same amount of time
preparing for class.
ChemWiki Group Control Group
Test Scores
Learning
Gains
Pre-Class
Preparation
Time
Test Scores
Learning
Gains
Pre-Class
Preparation
Time

36. LET’S LOOK AT FOUR OFTHE SIXTEEN
PUBLISHED PERCEPTIONS/EFFICACY STUDIES
Bliss et al., – Perceptions across eight colleges
Hilton et al., – Scottsdale Community College Math
Allen et al., – UC Davis Chemistry
Robinson et al., – Secondary science

37. DESIGN
Quasi-experimental ex post facto comparison of group
differences in terms of year-end standardized science
CRT scores.

38. POTENTIAL CONFOUNDS
SPED
ELP
Previous Science
Achievement
GeneralAcademic
Achievement
SES
Gender
Age
Course (Chemistry, Earth
Science, Biology)
Teacher Effect
Selection Bias

39. ANDWHAT ABOUTTEACHER EFFECT?
Isn’t it possible that the teacher that are competent
enough to develop their own materials are actually
more competent as teachers in general?
Textbooks and teachers are completely confounded.
Textbook may be a complete surrogate for teacher
effect.

40. CONTROLLING FORTEACHER EFFECT
Consider previous achievement of students as an
indication of general teacher effectiveness.
Create a standardized value of teacher effectiveness.
Use standardized value as a covariate control.

41. PROPENSITY SCORE MATCHING
Using available covariates, match individual treatment
subjects to subjects in a larger pool of possible controls.
UnmatchedTreatment Pool: n = 1612
Unmatched Control Pool: n = 2168
MatchedTreatment: n = 1274
MatchedControl: n = 1274
MatchedTotal: n = 2548

42. MATCHED SAMPLES
Matched
Control
Matched
Treatment
Matched
Total
Number of students 1274 1274 2548
Mean age 15.99 15.98 15.99
Percentage of Female Students 50.08% 49.69% 49.88%
Percentage of Male Students 49.92% 50.31% 50.12%
Percentage of ESL Students 0.94% 1.02% 0.98%
Percentage of Asian Students 0.31% 0.23% 0.27%
Percentage of Black Students 0.47% 0.31% 0.39%
Percentage of White Students 88.30% 87.52% 87.91%
Percentage of Hispanic Students 8.30% 9.50% 8.90%
Percentage of Native American Students 0.55% 0.63% 0.59%
Percentage of Pacific Islander Students 0.78% 0.86% 0.82%
Percentage of Multi-race Students 1.20% 0.94% 1.10%
Percentage of 9th Graders 39.08% 39.80% 39.44%
Percentage of 10th Graders 44.82% 44.98% 44.90%
Percentage of 11th Graders 15.54% 14.68% 15.11%
Percentage of 12th Graders 0.55% 0.55% 0.55%
Special Education 6.99% 7.22% 7.10%
Mean GPA 3.44 3.40 3.42
Percentage of Students in Biology 38.14% 39.17% 38.66%
Percentage of Students in Chemistry 34.30% 32.65% 33.48%
Percentage of Students in Earth Systems 27.55 28.18% 27.86%

43. PROPENSITY SCORE MATCHED SAMPLES

44. FINAL RESULTS
Simultaneous Regression of 2012 Scaled Scores
Predictor Estimate S.E. t
Intercept 57.01 5.12 11.13 ***
Treatment 0.65 0.24 2.67 **
2011 GPA -1.64 0.23 7.25 ***
2012 CRT1
Chemistry -6.59 1.01 -6.53 ***
Earth Science 3.94 0.53 7.44 ***
2011 CRT1
Chemistry 3.91 2.51 1.56
Earth Science -2.88 1.02 -2.83 **
Physics 5.1 0.89 5.75 ***
8th
Grade Science -5.96 1.17 -5.08 ***
2011 Scaled Score 0.68 0.15 44.42 ***
Gender2
1.16 0.24 4.84 ***
Age -0.49 0.26 -1.91
English Language Proficiency -3.86 1.18 -3.27 **
Special Education3
-1.73 0.48 -3.62 ***
Free and Reduced Lunch4
-0.31 0.26 -1.19
Teacher Effect 2.26 0.19 11.45 ***
* p< .05 **p<.01 ***p<.001
1
The dummy coded reference group for both the 2012 and 2011 CRTs is those who took the
biology test.
2
The dummy coded reference group for Gender is Female.
3
The dummy coded reference group for Special Education is Not Special Education.
4
The dummy coded reference group for Free-and-Reduced Lunch is Not Free-and-Reduced
Lunch.

45. CONCLUSION
There was a small but statistically significant difference
between students using traditional classroom sets of
textbooks and students using teacher developed
individual textbooks in terms of achievement as
measured by standardized year-end science CRT scores.
Even after controlling for multiple confounds, students
using teacher-developed open textbooks performed
better than control group students.

46. SYNTHESIZING
While some may be disappointed that OER materials have not
been found to significantly increase student learning outcomes,
this “non-finding” is nevertheless very important.
Given that (1) students and teachers generally find OER to be as
good or better as traditional textbooks, (2) students do not
perform worse when utilizing OER, students, parents and
taxpayers stand to save literally billions of dollars without any
negative impact on learning through the adoption of OER.

47. A REQUEST
Will you initiate research studies focused on perceptions
and efficacy of OER? Scholarly articles in this arena will
increase awareness and adoption of OER. If you would
like help in designing or implementing such studies, my
colleagues at the Open Education Group are happy to
assist.

48. A REVIEW OF RESEARCH ON THE
PERCEPTIONS AND EFFICACY OF
OER (AND A CALL FOR MORE!)
John Hilton III
http://johnhiltoniii.org
Open Education Group
http://openedgroup.org