Making Education Affordable for Students: A Case Study of Implementation and Faculty Usage of an Open Educational Resources Program

Abstract

The high cost of course materials negatively affects students’ academic progress. This case study reviews and analyzes the implementation and usage of a library-led Open Educational Resources (OER) program. The university library at Cal State LA established a new Scholarly Communication Open Resources eLearning (SCORE) pilot program in the Fall of 2021, which offers a $500 stipend to faculty for creating or redesigning a zero-cost course. This study examined faculty usage of the SCORE program from various colleges and academic disciplines. The study findings demonstrate that SCORE is both popular and successful. We hope that other libraries have the potential to replicate similar initiatives.

Keywords:

• Open Educational Resources (OER)
• faculty stipends
• OER initiatives
• library stipend program
• OER adoption
• SCORE
• Cal State LA Library
• affordable learning solutions

Acknowledgment

The author thanks Sarah Baker for reviewing the manuscript.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

This program is funded by CSU’s Affordable Learning Solutions and the Cal State LA University Library.