Freely sharing research knowledge and teaching resources is key to Athabasca University’s focus on access for all
This week is International Open Access Week, an annual effort to promote the free, online sharing of research knowledge—without the fees often charged for researchers to publish their findings and for readers to access the work.
Access is at the heart of Athabasca University’s mission—access to education, to research knowledge, and to educational resources, wherever students live and whatever their life circumstances.
We talked to Athabasca University’s open educational resource librarian Dan Cockroft about what open access means for students, researchers, educators, and the generally curious at a university like no other.
What do we mean by “open access”?
When we talk about open access, typically that’s research that is licensed in a way that people can share without any restrictions. There won’t be any login screens, people can send work to their colleagues, to their students, and share it freely with no additional complications.
AU Press was the first institutional press in Canada to exclusively publish open access. We are a leader in the open-access space with our model. The International Review of Research in Open and Distributed Learning (IRRODL, published by AU Press), is the number-one-ranked diamond open-access journal in Canada [meaning there are no fees for authors or readers]. It really opens the door for anyone to publish; and it opens access for readers, so we really are a leader in this space.
How is open access different than open educational resources (OER)?
The distinction I like to make is that open-access content is usually informational, and OER is usually educational. In OER textbooks you’re learning about a subject as opposed to reading higher-level research.
OER is defined by the ability to create derivatives, so basically these are resources that let you modify them. Generally speaking, we say something counts as an OER if it meets the “5 Rs”: reuse, remix, redistribute, retain, and revise. For retain, you can keep copies for yourself legally; revise you can change the content the way you like it; remix means you can combine different resources together; redistribute, you can share it freely; and reuse, you can reuse it as you please.
With the educational material, you can change it. Maybe there’s a chapter that’s missing that you would like to teach your students. You can either write your own, or you can grab a chapter from a different OER.
How are OER created by an author?
It’s easy! You go the creative commons website; they have a licence builder, and you just choose what you want others to be able to do with your work, and it spits out a completed licence for you to display on the work. And that's it!
How do OER benefit students?
The first obvious benefit is saving money on textbook costs. There’s also unlimited access. At the library, we get lots of requests from students who want to get started early on their coursework, but that isn’t always possible. With OER, students can start reading as soon as they want. They can also keep the book forever, download it, and share it freely. Being open access, it’s also not bound to any one format—and you don’t have those pesky login screens. There’s also enhanced accessibility options. If someone has an accessibility need, it’s just so easy to change the format to what works for you.
There’s the also the ability for co-creation, for example. Some of the courses at AU don’t just use the OER—part of the assignment is to create an OER with your classmates. So instead of just doing these disposable assignments where you feel like you’re doing work and only your instructor sees it and that’s it, this is work that future students will use and improve upon, so it really makes students proud of what they’re doing and involved in their course.
It comes down to equity, our vision of being an open university and eliminating barriers … OER is about opening up access, and the promise of OER is that your work goes beyond your own purpose.
Dan Cockroft, open educational resources librarian at AU
How do OER benefit educators?
The key benefits of OER adoption for educators all revolve around modification. Perhaps you have found an openly licensed textbook that isn’t quite a perfect fit for your course. Thanks to the open license, you can remove redundant chapters, add new ones from other OER, and rearrange it all to your fancy. Legally! There’s also the ability to localize, translate, and update text too. And if you’re looking for assistance doing that, we even have an initiative called the OER Publishing Support program to help AU instructors produce a polished version of any OER through AU Press.
Why is AU a proponent of OER?
It comes down to equity, our vision of being an open university and eliminating barriers … OER is about opening up access, and the promise of OER is that your work goes beyond your own purpose. Not only are you using other people’s work, once you’ve created something, other people can use it in the same way, so it really contributes to this ecosystem that builds upon itself.
What is AU doing to grow its use of OER?
We have a really unique and fantastic OER publishing program. It’s known as the Remix imprint. A lot of institutions will provide funding for authors to write their own OER or remix. At AU, we work with AU Press so it’s a much more formalized process that results in a really polished product at the end. We provide project management, typesetting, design, file conversion, and multi-media hosting, all in a really nice platform called Manifold.
One of the challenges that we’ve had as the OER community in general is combatting the quality concerns. OER is and has been sort of the Wild West—there’s an advantage and a disadvantage to the fact that anyone can create an OER. This model really reduces barriers, which is fantastic, but it also opens the door to low-quality textbooks. With this program [Remix] we’re really aiming to showcase the gold standard.
Where can we find OERs and open-access publications?
There are a number of OER repositories with varying strengths and weaknesses. If you’re an AU student or staff member, the best way to find OER is to contact me directly (dcockroft@athabascau.ca) so we can have a conversation about the types of resources that might best fit your needs.
If you’re looking to publish in an open-access journal, check out the SciFree publishing journal search tool. Here, you’ll find waivers and discounts on article processing charges from more than 9,000 open-access scientific journals around the world.
Open-access resources at AU:
- SciFree publishing journal search tool: to find waivers and discounts on article processing charges from more than 9,000 open-access scientific journals (requires an AU email address)
- AU library recorded information session about SciFree
- AU library Open Access LibGuide
- AU Press
Open educational resources (OER) at AU:
Events (Join the OER Community Corner | Community in Viva Engage for event links. Note: Students must be logged into their AU email to access this online group):
- Open Community of Practice (Quarterly)
- Open Education Week (March)
- On-demand presentations on open topics
- OER Publishing Support Program Info Sessions