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OER SUSTAINABILITY CASE STUDY:
SUNY FREDONIA
OER SUSTAINABILITY CASE STUDY:
SUNY FREDONIA
Using Incentives and Transparency in Textbook Prices to Grow OER
and Maximize Student Savings
August 2019
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OER SUSTAINABILITY CASE STUDY:
SUNY FREDONIA
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The information included in this case study was drawn from a team interview with 6 members of SUNY Fredonia’s OER Sustainability Plan project team on
August 28, 2018, OER documents provided by the team, and information from the SUNY Fredonia website.
The State University of New York at Fredonia (Fredonia) is a public master’s degree granting
University with about 4,400 undergraduate students (4,600 total students). Fredonia began
its Open Education Resources (OER) initiative in May, 2017 when it received initial OER grant
funding from the SUNY system.
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Some faculty at the University were already using OER resources,
but the grant funding served as a catalyst to significantly scale up the work. Fredonia developed
and delivered 21 OER courses (49 sections) in 2017-18; 3,200 OER course enrollments saved
students more than $200k in textbook costs, according to Fredonia.
Lowering textbook costs are part of the University’s strategic plan to reduce costs across campus. While the University’s
primary motivation for OER is student savings, faculty are motivated by the pedagogical opportunities it offers; faculty
also acknowledge that many students are not purchasing textbooks.
Approach and Vision
Fredonia’s OER work is coordinated by the University’s
Professional Development Center, Reed Library, and Ofce
of Online Learning. The Professional Development Center
leads the OER team, but it functions as an integrated unit;
there is no designated OER coordinator. The Associate
Provost for Academic Affairs also supports the effort.
Fredonia began its OER work with a series of information
sessions in summer 2017 and proceeded to identify faculty
already using OER resources. They kicked off their OER
initiative at the annual Teaching and Learning Conference
in August, which included a nationally recognized OER
speaker discussing the impact of OER on student success.
Faculty and staff from other SUNY campuses with more
advanced OER programs also presented at the event.
Faculty interested in developing an OER course were
required to apply, and the application was then reviewed
by the librarians and members of a textbook affordability
committee. Priority was given to faculty proposing to use
OER across all sections of a course, in general education
courses, or in courses with high textbook costs (current
textbook prices were submitted with the application).
Proposals from all 36 instructors who submitted were
approved, with some faculty creating multiple courses
(54 stipends awarded). Faculty could either adopt or
create OER, and many utilized existing resources from
Lumen Learning.
During the redesign process, librarian support was available
to faculty. Librarians also reviewed the completed syllabus,
checked the licensing to ensure a majority of the materials
were OER, and conrmed that any required course
materials cost less than $50 per student. After the course
was approved, the faculty member received one of three
stipends: 1) a $600 stipend per course; 2) a $750 stipend
per faculty team member when all sections of a course were
converted; or 3) a $750 stipend for converting a general
education or high enrollment course (50+ students). The
larger stipends paid to faculty team members incentivized
full course conversions in English, chemistry, and math.
As the Fredonia team considers options for developing
a sustainable OER model, they have expressed interest
in a full- or half-time OER coordinator. However, with the
University’s current budget situation they don’t expect new
funding will be available to support that position. Instead,
they may need to consider alternative ways to reallocate
existing resources to support and lead the work, which
is currently an additional responsibility to their existing
workload.
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OER SUSTAINABILITY CASE STUDY:
SUNY FREDONIA
OER Resources and Communication
The nature of Fredonia’s organizing framework ensured
that faculty support was built into the course development
process. In addition to kicking off the project at the annual
Teaching and Learning Conference, the OER team hosts
two-hour OER workshops every other Friday to provide
information on OER and assist faculty in locating materials;
scheduled appointments are also available. The library also
offers an extensive online “Libguide” with information on
OER resources, copyright, and faculty support.
In addition, instructional designers are available to provide
personalized support, such as helping faculty evaluate
different courseware options or providing technical
guidance on editing online textbooks. The Ofce of Online
Learning also offered a workshop on integrating OER into
online courses.
Fredonia also has made progress developing infrastructure
around OER. They worked with the Registrar’s ofce to add
a data system identication ag for low-cost courses, and
developed workow processes that allows them to identify
OER courses.
Although Fredonia’s process for recruiting and developing
courses proved successful, it was quite time consuming.
They recognized that management of the process could
be simplied by establishing a single date for the course
deliverables instead of tracking custom dates for each
faculty member. They also now have processes in place to
track faculty’s OER projects.
Fredonia has been forward-thinking about how it markets
OER to administrators. They’ve provided informational
email messages to department chairs identifying the
courses successfully converted to OER, the savings
to students, and the process for faculty to propose
developing an OER course. The team also contributes
to the monthly Academic Affairs update, and shared
information during the Associate Provost’s meeting with
the Deans.
Exemplary Practice: Textbook Aordability Committee
Fredonia previously assembled a textbook affordability
committee—comprised of faculty and representatives
from the bookstore, library, and nancial aid—to address
concerns about textbook costs. The committee has played
a unique role in the OER initiative. In addition to serving as
part of the OER proposal review and selection committee,
the committee’s activities also helped recruit faculty for
OER course development.
The committee worked with Fredonia’s in-house college
bookstore to identify courses with high cost textbooks
(priced at $200 or higher). This course list was shared with
the academic Deans, many of whom were unaware of the
high-priced textbooks that faculty were using. The Deans
then met individually with the faculty members teaching
those courses to discuss their textbook costs and inquire if
they were willing to use OER instead.
Lessons Learned: The textbook committee approach
was an innovative way to recruit faculty and maximize
savings to students. Approximately 5 of 36 OER adopters
were faculty that the committee had approached. These
faculty generally hadn’t considered cost as a factor in
their textbook selection process and agreed to use OER
instead of commercial textbooks. Fredonia plans to
continue this recruitment strategy in the coming year.
This approach exposes Deans and faculty to systemic
concerns about textbook affordability, provides a
way to directly address those concerns, and offers an
opportunity to further educate the academic community
on the nancial and pedological benets of OER.
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OER SUSTAINABILITY CASE STUDY:
SUNY FREDONIA
Looking Ahead:
Sustainability Planning
Fredonia has already developed many of the processes
and supports that lead to sustainability. As Fredonia
continues to build on its initial OER successes, it should
focus on developing the resources and culture necessary
to sustain the effort. In the proposed sustainability
framework, priority areas for Fredonia are highlighted in
blue and initial recommendations are provided below.
Infrastructure
Finalize the addition of a low-cost course identication
tag in the course catalogue so students can identify
and search for low-cost courses.
Document the process being developed to review and
update OER course materials.
Resources
The role, responsibilities, and cost of an OER
coordinator should be determined so potential
funding options can be explored for the position.
Alternately, discuss whether the current OER work
can continue to be “funded” by reallocating time of
the current staff and possibly ofoading some of their
other responsibilities.
Consider whether the faculty incentive structure for
converting multiple course sections could be modied
to create greater efciencies (e.g., teams split a larger
stipend to create a single OER course that is used
across sections).
Identify the number of course sections that utilize a
fee-based platform (e.g., Lumen Learning) and explore
how these courses can be sustained if the current
SUNY subsidy is removed.
Investigate platforms to accept direct student
payments for access to OER materials.
Culture
Develop a plan to market OER courses to current
and prospective students once the low-cost course
attribute is visible in the course catalog. Consider
engaging with student groups (e.g., student
government) to help promote OER.
Continue to develop marketing/recruitment materials
for faculty and administrators that highlight the
program successes; draw connections to the
University’s strategic vision around student cost
reductions.
Connect with institutional research to identify new
metrics that could support faculty and administrators’
interest in OER as a driver of student success.
