Open Educational Resources: 10 Projects
The NUI Galway OER project is delighted to announce the funding of 10 impactful and innovative OER projects in NUI Galway. This project will create OER that will be used in teaching and research in NUI Galway and further afield.
Textbooks are expensive. That is hardly a controversial statement. The rising cost of textbooks in higher education has been noted as a concern and can have a serious impact on student success. The NUI Galway international office recommends that students arrive at University prepared to spend around €60 per month on textbooks and course materials. Research by Costello and Bolger (2019) into the cost of required and recommended materials in one Irish HEI found that textbooks ranged in price from $0.99 to $452. Over the course of a degree, the cost to students becomes significant. One move towards alleviating the pressure is the Open Educational Resources (OER) Project Grant Scheme sponsored by the Student Projects Fund and spearheaded by the Library.
Cost savings, of course, are not the only benefit of OER in teaching and learning. Materials from disparate sources can be brought together into one comprehensive and easily accessible resource, students can actively co-create learning materials with lecturers engaging with materials at a deeper level, and materials can be customised to match the exact context of a module, class or learning environment.
The OER grant called for applications from those interested in remixing a current OER, i.e., adapting an existing resource for use in NUI Galway, or creating a new resource. That call was answered by a wonderful range of project suggestions from a variety of disciplines. After a difficult decision-making process, we are delighted to announce that €20,000 in OER funding will be divided between ten exciting projects, many of which are student-driven or involve students as partners.
The OERs developed through this grant are estimated to result in a total student cost savings of €45,000 per year. This is based on the average number of students enrolled in each course and the cost of the learning resources being replaced by the OER.
The OER will be hosted on NUI Galway’s Open Press platform: openpress.nuigalway.ie.
We’re excited and eager to watch these projects develop and offer guidance and assistance from the Library. Take a look at the funded OER projects below:
| Name | Author | Co-authors |
|---|---|---|
| Children's fiction in Spanish | Dr Pilar Alderete Diez | Louise McMenamin (First Year Global Languages Student) |
| Media for social change: a syllabus | Dr. Andrew Ó Baoill | Students in 2022 MES4100 module |
| Your Anatomy companion | Daniel Coyle | Prof. Peter Cantillon |
| Open Histology | Dr Helen Dodson | Shauna McBride |
| Bilingual Genomics data science information for schools | Dr. Pilib Ó Broin | Barry Digby, PhD student CRT in Genomics Data Science |
| Algebraic coding theory | Dr Emil Skoldberg | Peter Phelan, NUI Galway (student); Milo Orlich, Aalto University, Finland (student) |
| MISTRAL - language tools for students | Dr. Francesca Nicora | Oriana Bologna, Professor Laura McLoughlin |
| Exploring local cultural heritage in place: A playbook for schools and museums | Dr. Sally McHugh | Dr. Tony Hall, School of Education; Dr. Fiona Concannon, CELT |
| Open modules in NUI Galway | Neasa Gorrell | Dr. Kelly Fincham |
| Material for victory: The memoirs of Andrew J Kettle | Prof. Niamh Reilly | Pres Michael D Higgins (Foreword) Niamh Reilly (Coordinator/lead editor) Kettles Heritage Society (Declan & Trish Kettle) (Community partners and contributors) Students in history, politics and publishing |
More information on these resources will be available soon and they will be openly available for all to view and use!
Anyone interested in creating an OER of their own for teaching or learning is welcome to do so by visiting openpress.nuigalway.ie. More resources are available from the Library’s OER Guide.
Written by the OER Project Group
Comments