OER Benefits and Challenges

1. Open Educational
Resources (OER)
Benefits and Challenges
By Camelia Gavrila

2. Benefits:
• OER are free. Textbooks in higher education became very
expensive therefore less accessible for students. Many students
withdraw from the course or do not register because of the
expensive cost of the materials. OER can be an excellent
alternative for the textbooks;
• They might contribute to an increment in enrolment. The use of
OER as a substitution for the course textbooks may encourage
more students to enroll in the course.

3. Benefits:
• OER are accessible to students at any time. Students like to check
the material before the course begins, therefore they can prepare
for the class in advance. The course materials are available for
students to revisit at any time, during or after the course has
ended;
• They provide a lifelong learning experience;
• OER enhance opportunity for learning for both, current and
prospective students.

4. Benefits:
• They are designed for a larger audience: for students and faculty
anywhere;
• OER can be shared among educators, resulting in a better
preparedness and adaptation of diverse teaching strategies;
• They can be customized. Faculty can adapt the material according
to the students needs. Students can also participate in creating
learning material for the course;
• OER provide excellent Professional Development opportunities;

5. Challenges:
• Their accessibility is subject to change. The online material can
disappear if it is not archived or backed up in a trusted repository;
• They are not always available internationally. Depending on the
country, some universities do not have sufficient financial
resources to maintain access to OER;
• OER can be difficult to find. More professional development
courses are necessary for faculty to better understand how to use
OER and where to search for them;

6. Challenges:
• Some faculty feel intimidated by the copyright laws, feeling that
they threaten the ownership of intellectual propriety. For this
reason, more Professional Development courses are necessary to
understand that open licenses and Creative Commons licenses
recognize and reinforce intellectual ownership;
• OER are time-consuming. They demand a lot of time finding
material for the course, time which is not compensated;
• Once posted they are difficult to remove.

7. Reference:
• Open Educational Resources (OER): Tools for Affordable Learning
• https://libguides.libraries.wsu.edu/affordablelearning/oerprocon