March 8, 2023

Open Education Week 2023

March 20-24 

Author: Stephanie Western | stephanie.western@usu.edu

OE Week booth in the library

The OER table in the Merrill-Cazier Library during last year's Open Education Week

This year’s celebration of Open Education Week will take place from March 20–24. This is an opportunity to celebrate Open Educational Resources (OER) as well as share information about them and help their use become more widespread. This will be USU’s biggest celebration of open education yet, with engaging and informational events for both students and educators being held throughout the week. 

About Open Education Resources

How much did you spend on textbooks this semester?

A board where students shared how much they spent on textbooks, created as part of Open Education Week 2022 

Open Educational Resources (OER) are teaching and learning materials that are released under an open license. This permits users to freely access, download, adapt, and share them. OER can be made more accessible, more inclusive, and more culturally relevant than traditional commercial course materials. Free access to course materials is especially important considering that 85% of USU students have delayed or skipped purchasing course materials due to costs—which negatively impacts their grades—and that at least 33% of USU students at the Logan campus are food insecure, with statewide numbers likely higher. Zero-Cost Course Materials such as OER help level the playing field for underrepresented students who struggle to pay for tuition and living costs.

Impact of OER at USU since 2014, by the numbers

  • Student Savings: $4.1 million
  • Students Affected: 50,054
  • Instructors Using OER: 277

The OER Program at USU Libraries is the host of Open Education Week and the home for all things related to OER at Utah State. Staff at the OER program work to promote accessibility and student success by locating, editing, publishing, promoting, and managing copyrights for OER to be used at USU. Program staff also oversee the OER Grant program, which helps educators at USU create new OER and integrate existing OER into their curricula. 

Student Events

USU Students on the Logan campus can stop by the OER tables at the Merrill-Cazier Library on Wednesday the 22nd and Thursday the 23rd. OER staff will be at the tables to inform students about how they can find courses that use Zero-Cost Course Materials in Banner and College Scheduler and to hand out cookies, bookmarks, and other fun things. Students visiting the OER tables will also be able to contribute to large display boards by adding how much they spent on textbooks this semester and writing what else they could have done with that money. 

Educator Events

Teach and learn with Open Education Resources

Educators play a crucial role by using OER in their courses or creating/adapting new open-license materials. The Utah Academic Library Consortium (UALC) and Utah Education and Telehealth Network (UETN) are co-hosting a virtual symposium for educators on March 20–23. The event will feature sessions on building OER initiatives, how-tos on PressbooksEDU, a showcase of OER projects created by Utah faculty and staff and a Q&A session where participants can chat with project creators.

Registration for this free virtual symposium is open now. For details, visit uen.org/oer23.

Register Now