1. Librarians’ Perceptions
of OER
OpenEd 2014
Beck Pitt
The Open University (UK)
Eleni Zazani
Birkbeck College
Nancy Graham
University of Roehampton

2. Background

3. CC-BY 4.0 Bea de los Arcos
oerresearchhub.org
#oerrhub @OER_Hub
• 2-year open research project funded by William & Flora Hewlett Foundation
• Aiming to build the most comprehensive picture of OER impact
• Open collaboration model across different educational sectors
• Global reach but with a USA focus
• Fellowship Scheme
• Researching openness in the open

4. Keyword Hypothesis
Performance OER improve student performance/satisfaction
Openness People use OER differently from other online materials
Access OER widen participation in education
Retention OER can help at-risk learners to finish their studies
Reflection OER use leads educators to reflect on their practice
Finance OER adoption brings financial benefits for students/institutions
Indicators Informal learners use a variety of indicators when selecting OER
Support Informal learners develop their own forms of study support
Transition OER support informal learners in moving to formal study
Policy OER use encourages institutions to change their policies
Assessment Informal assessments motivate learners using OER

5. OER Impact Map
http://oermap.org

6. Project Co-PILOT

7. Methodology

8. Librarian Questionnaire

9. Research Questions
OER Research Hub hypotheses:
OER improve student performance/satisfaction
People use OER differently from other online materials
OER use leads educators to reflect on their practice*
OER adoption brings financial benefits for students/institutions
OER use encourages institutions to change their policies*
Special areas of interest (CoPILOT):
Encourage creation and sharing of OER
Curating & sustaining OER
Closing training gaps
Photo credit: CC-BY 4.0 Beck Pitt

10. Librarian Surveys
Two surveys launched during Open Access week (21-25 October 2013).
Both Surveys closed 2 January 2014.

11. Librarian Sample
• 81.0% Female (n=175), 17.6% Male (n=38) and
1.4% Transgender (n=3)
• Nearly 90% of respondents have English as their
first spoken language (89.4%, n=193)
• Over 85% of respondents have a
Postgraduate/Graduate School University Degree
(87.4%, n=188)
• Over a quarter of respondents had worked as a
librarian for more than 20 years (25.3%, n=50)

12. OER Behaviours & Perspectives

13. Librarian Overview
In the last year…
• Over half of respondents have published a blog post (50.5%, n=110)
• Nearly 70% of respondents have shared an image online (68.8%,
n=150)
• Almost a third of respondents contributed to a Wiki (30.3%, n=66)
• Almost half of respondents contributed to an Internet Forum (49.1%,
n=107)
• 55.0% of respondents have downloaded a Podcast (n=120) but only
8.3% have recorded and uploaded a Podcast (n=18)

14. Librarian Overview
• Nearly 40% of respondents have adapted OER to fit their needs
(39.4%, n=85)
• 31.9% of respondents have created OER for study or teaching
(n=69)
Top three challenges faced when using OER:
Knowing where to find resources (60.6%, n=120)
Finding resources of a sufficiently high quality
(60.1%, n=119)
Finding suitable resources in my subject area
(56.1%, n=111)
Over 85% of respondents said that
they would be more likely to select a
particular resource when searching for
OER if it had been created/uploaded
by a reputable/trusted institution or
person (87.4%, n=180)

15. Use and Creation of OER
14.8% of respondents have created resources themselves and published them
on an open license (n=32)
78.1% of respondents who have created
resources and published them on an open
license say open licensing is “very
important” or “important” to them when
using resources in their teaching (n=25)
87.5% of respondents who have created
resources and published them on an open
license told us they have seen the CC
license and know what it means (n=28).

16. Librarian Overview
Main purposes for using OER in the context of Librarian role:
To help find available content for learning, teaching or training
(72.5%, n=124) and/or to get new ideas and inspiration (72.5%,
n=124)
As a result of using OER as a respondents strongly agreed or agreed that …
• Nearly 70% make use of a wider range of multimedia (13.1%, n=19 &
56.6%, n=82 respectively)
• Almost 60% have a more up-to-date knowledge of their subject area (16.8%,
n=24 & 42.7%, n=61)
• 47.3% have improved ICT skills (10.8%, n=16 & 36.5%, n=54)

17. “We actually did a study recently that
showed a 30% reduction in textbook
costs after a big push to move to open
access textbooks.”
• Nearly 40% of respondents believe
their students have saved money by
using OER (37.7%, n=61)
• Over 50% of respondents think that
their institution benefits financially by
using OER (53.5%, n=85)
Picture Credit: 401(K) 2012 (CC-BY-
SA 2.0)
• Over 40% of respondents don’t know
whether their institution benefits
financially by using OER (40.9%, n=65)
• Over half of respondents don’t know
whether their students have saved
money by using OER (51.2%, n=83)

18. Creating OER and measuring its
impact

19. Do you measure the impact of the open educational
resources you create?
Of the respondents who create OER for study or teaching
and/or create OER and publish them on an open license,
nearly 30% told us they measure the impact of the OER
they create (29.7%, n=22)
• 60.8% of respondents who create OER do not measure
the impact of the OER they create (n=45)
• Nearly 10% of respondents who create OER don’t know
if they measure the impact of the OER they create
(9.5%, n=7)
Image credit: Public Domain
https://openclipart.org/detail/38527/-by-rejon-38527

20. Please tell us more about how you share the open educational
resources you create
“Upload to
YouTube”
“Via the NHS e-learning
repository and from our
organisational website.”

21. Please tell us more about how you measure the impact of the
open educational resources you create
Respondents who told us
how they currently
measure impact:
60.9% look at
statistics/usage/analytics
(n=14)
13.0% Feedback (n=3)
26.1% Both analytics and
feedback (n=6)
“At a rather trivial level, I check
how many times resources are
accessed.”

22. Institutional Policies and Openness

23. Source: Infographic created by Eleni
Zazani CC-BY 4.0
In the context of your role as librarian, what kinds of
policies would help you to be more open?

24. Summary

25. Lessons Learnt
Next Steps
Effective Collaboration

26. Summary of Results
Librarians and Open Educational Resources
• What do we mean by “measuring impact”?
• How is quality currently understood? (Changing perceptions)
• Finding resources remains a pertinent issue across the board: visibility
• Librarians working in “silos”… educators too
• What do you think? Do these findings resonate with you?
• We need you! Looking for YOUR best examples of impact...
• Read our overall findings in our OER Evidence report 2013-2014
http://oerresearchhub.org/

27. Bibliography
Bueno-de-la-Fuente, G. (2012). The roles of libraries and information professionals in open educational resources (OER)
initiatives.. Available from: http://publications.cetis.ac.uk/2012/492. [Accessed 23 November 2013].
De Beer, T. (2012). SCORE library survey report. Available from: http://www.open.ac.uk/score/news/score-library-survey-report.
[Accessed 23 November 2013].
Graham, N., and Secker, J. (2012). Librarians, information literacy and open educational resources: report of a survey. Available
from: http://delilaopen.files.wordpress.com/2012/04/findingsharingoers_reportfinal1.pdf. [Accessed 23 November 2013].
Harris, S. (2012). Moving towards an open access future: the role of academic libraries. London. Available from:
http://www.uk.sagepub.com/repository/binaries/pdf/Library-OAReport.pdf. [Accessed 23 November 2013].
Taylor & Francis. (2013). Facilitating access to free online resources: challenges and opportunities for the library community.
Available from: http://www.tandf.co.uk/libsite/pdf/TF-whitepaper-free-resources.pdf. [Accessed 23 November 2013].
TBI Communications on behalf of InTech. (2012). Assessing the role of librarians in an Open Access world. Croatia. Available
from: http://www.intechopen.com/js/ckeditor/kcfinder/upload/files/Role of the Librarian_Survey_Findings_Jun12.pdf. [Accessed
23 November 2013].
Zazani, Eleni. The Emerging Information Professional: 21st Century attitudes, technologies and practices. Chandos publishing
(forthcoming)
Open Definition on Licensing (http://opendefinition.org/guide/)
Creative Commons logo: http://mirrors.creativecommons.org/presskit/icons/cc.large.png
“Putting money into a piggybank” image: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Putting_money_into_a_piggybank.jpg

28. Thanks for listening!
oerresearchhub.org
http://oermap.org
Twitter: @OER_Hub @BeckPitt
@EleniZazani @msnancygraham

29. in service of The Open University