A quick look at why to adopt Open Educational Resource (OER) materials. A good fit for some; perhaps not so good for others.

1. OER:
5 PLUSSES AND 5 MINUSES
"OER: 5 Plusses and 5 Minuses" by Bob Nylander, Highline College is licensed
under CC BY-NC-SA 4.0

2. Why am I interested in Open
Educational Resources?
Cheap or free textual
materials for students in
computer technology
courses for the legal
profession
Control of content
(keeping up to date in
rapidly changing area)

3. Why am I interested in OER?
Feeling of satisfaction
for being creative
Possibility of sharing
with affiliated schools

4. Why am I interested in OER?
I would like to act as a
“Johnny Appleseed” on
my campus to help
others move in this
direction

5. What might keep me from using
OER?
It's hard to find material
that is “right on” for my
area
It's sometimes hard to
know if material is
properly credited or
permissions obtained

6. What might keep me from using
OER?
It's a lot of work to
create a replacement for
a text, when compared
to ordering a published
text; not everyone is a
textbook author or wants
to be one.
If it's free will people think it's no good?

7. What might keep me from using
OER?
It seems like a lot of
time will be spent with
shake-down exercises
and practice before
using

8. Picture credits
Slide 2: “Altair 8800 Computer with Eight Inch Floppy Disk
System” by Michael Holley, released by author into the Public
Domain CC0
Slide 3:
"Electronic Discovery Reference Model” by EDRM (edrm.net),
is licensed CC BY 3.0
Slide 4:
"Spot Welder" by Andreas Feininger, Farm Security
Administration, US Government, is in the Public Domain

9. Picture credits
Slide 5:
“Anthony's Octopus” by Matt Bissett-Johnson is
licensed Creative Commons Attribution-
NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Australia License
Slide 6:
“Laughing Toddler” by Katie Thomas is licensed CC BY
2.0

10. Picture credits
Slide 7: “Spc. Stephanie Hart, paralegal, 118th Military
Police Battalion, Rhode Island National Guard, helps
provide perimeter security during medical evacuation
training in the field exercise portion of the 2013 Paralegal
Warrior Training Course at Fort McCoy, Wis., July 21.”
(US Army photo by Sgt. Darryl L. Montgomery, 319th
Mobile Public Affairs Detachment) US Government photo
is in the Public Domain

11. NOTES

12. "OER: 5 Plusses and 5 Minuses" by Bob Nylander, Highline College is licensed
under CC BY-NC-SA 4.0
FRONT AND BACK COVER ART FROM LIBREOFFICE IMPRESS VERSION 4,
A FOSS (FREE AND OPEN SOFTWARE)