Albertaoer.com was launched in 2014 with a mandate to bring Alberta post-secondary institutions together in support of open educational resources. Two million dollars was provided to the University of Alberta, in trust, to lead a project to:
- Assist with reducing the cost of a post-secondary education for students; and,
- Provide students and faculty members with the flexibility they need, offering updated, relevant content for learning.
A provincial steering committee was established which led to the award of a series of grants in the three categories, namely: sustainability, creation/use and promotion. The “Awareness” grant category intends to support the cultural change needed throughout institutions of Alberta to utilize and support OER provincially. The “Content” grant category intends to support the use of existing OER materials by supplementing current material with complementary content. This includes test items and course wraps, lesson plans, presentations, etc. The “Sustainability” grant category intends to support capacity development and ensure that a sustainable foundation to support OER initiatives is established. This includes technical infrastructure, institutional needs, etc.
With over 90 applications, a total of 15 projects were successful in receiving funding. This session will focus on the process followed, including research and communications plans, as well as future directions of the project.
The Initiative grant selection process was aligned to the following intended Outcomes: Learner Impact, Cost-Savings, Collaboration, Enhance Awareness and Support for OER, Sustainability of OER in Alberta. The intent was for each accepted proposal to support capacity development and ensure that a sustainable foundation to support OER initiatives was established. Criteria included CC licensing, demonstration of cost-savings, inter-departmental / inter-institutional collaboration, and meeting of more than one grant category.
In addition to these 18 projects, the initiative has also funded an open call attendance of the Open Education Conference to all Campus Alberta institutions. Those attending the conference have been reimbursed and have provided the committee a 1 page reflection of the conference.
Promotion of the initiative was strongly championed by VP Academic leaders in each of the 26 Campus Alberta institutions. Without their distribution of initiative announcements, the awareness would have been challenging.
