Open Educational Resources Committee Meeting: March 17, 2022

Zoom / Conference Call

Members attending: Amber Burtis (Southern Illinois University Carbondale), Catherine Galarza-Espino (Morton College), Kim Hale (Columbia College Chicago), Dan Matthews, co-chair (Moraine Valley Community College), Christina Norton (Bradley University), Tineka Scalzo (City Colleges of Chicago), Janet Swatscheno (University of Illinois Chicago), Chris Sweet, co-chair (Illinois Wesleyan University)

Members absent: Densie Cote (College of DuPage), Tamara Townsend (City Colleges of Chicago)

CARLI Staff attending: Elizabeth Clarage, Anne Craig, Michele Leigh

Board Liaison: Jacob Jeremiah (Oakton Community College)

Decisions

• February meeting minutes were approved.

Tasks Assigned

• Minutes taken by Janet Swatscheno.
• Elizabeth Clarage will send the committee access to the evaluation data for the CARLI OER Course.
• Dan Matthews and Janet Swatscheno volunteered to present at ILA. Chris Sweet and Tineka Scalzo volunteered for the panel. CARLI staff is also available to present.
• Chris Sweet will create a more comprehensive list of Illinois OER Success Stories.

Announcements

• Member Announcements:
  • Amber Burtis (Southern Illinois University Carbondale):
    • SIUC pulling together a proposal for the Illinois SCOERs grant.
    • COMM 101 is interested in creating an OER and it is a high enrollment course.
• CARLI Announcements:
  • CARLI is considering having Jennifer Creasey, Senior Director of State Relations and Marissa Brewer, Associate Director of Advocacy in the UI Office of Governmental Relations do a webinar on tips and best practices for advocacy.
  • Anne Craig participated in a SPARC/PIRG meeting to speak about the Department of Education Open Textbook Pilot grant.
    • CARLI Is hopeful that it will receive the additional funding for the Illinois SCOERs program since it was originally funded at 50%.
    • A member of Senator Durbin’s office was present and stated that the senator continues to be supportive of the program.
    • Other open textbook projects presented on their work and the enormous savings to students.
    • PIRG discussed results from a student survey on OER.
    • SPARC is hoping to ensure widespread support for OER funding moving forward.
  • Anne Craig asked for the OER Success stories collected in a Google form during Open Education week to use in a report.
  • There are a number of CARLI retirements and three positions.
  • CARLI has two new committees which were previously task forces:
    • Discovery Primo VE Committee
    • E-Resources Management Committee
  • Call for committee members will go out next month.
  • Illinois SCOERs grant proposals are due April 1.
  • OEN is doing a Manifold Pilot Project
    • Michele Leigh/CARLI applied and was accepted to be part of the pilot to learn more about the platform.

Discussion

• Continuing Education
  • OER Professional Development Sessions: Open Pedagogy Series
    • Both workshops had over 100 registrants.
    • Live attendance was low, but many were interested in the recorded version.
    • There is a OEN Certificate in Open Pedagogy planned in the future.
    • Some people were unable to get into the Zoom meeting for some reason.
  • CARLI OER Course: Understanding and Promoting Open Educational Resources
    • February Course: Kim Hale thought the course went very well. A colleague commented that he learned a lot and felt more comfortable talking about OER.
    • Elizabeth Clarage will send the committee access to the evaluation data.
    • Kim Hale suggested developing a more advanced course as well to help those who have a basic understanding of OER but want to take their program to the next level.
    • Chris Sweet commented that CARLI has largely relied on outside expertise and help for advanced trainings.
    • Anne Craig suggested the CARLI Counts project could be a good model for creating a larger more collaborative project on advanced OER but volunteers from the committee would need to shepherd it through.
    • Dan Matthews commented that ALA has an OER Roadshow that we could host in Illinois.
  • CARLI OER Faculty Workshop
    • Took place on February 23rd and everything went smoothly.
    • Christina Norton and Sue Shultz will do the March  session.
• Upcoming OER Office Hours
  • Dan Matthews will facilitate the meeting and Catherine Galarza-Espino will take notes.
  • Topic: Faculty/student collaboration.
• Future OER Offerings, Summer Courses and New Options
  • The OER course has been very popular to do over the summer.
• Spark Presentation OER Commons Hub
  • The group is meeting again next Friday to create a PowerPoint presentation for the April 1st program. The rest of the program will centered on OER, equity, diversity, and inclusion.
• Open Hub Presentation at ILA
  • Dan created and shared a draft proposal.
  • Suggestions for changes to the first two learning outcomes:
    • Change the first learning outcome to “understand”.
    • Understand the purpose and scope of the Open Illinois Hub.
    • Changed presenters to CARLI OER Committee.
    • Description and title will change slightly.
    • Dan Matthews and Janet Swatscheno volunteered to present.
    • Chris Sweet and Tineka Scalzo volunteered for the panel.
    • CARLI staff is willing and able to present as well.
    • Presenters must register for the conference.
    • Proposal is due April 4th.
• Illinois SCOERs Grant
  • Continue to hold Office hours on Fridays.
  • Application Review Committee meets next week.
• Open Illinois Hub Updates
  • Denise sent email to Elizabeth that she was trying to add the College of DuPage resources to OER Commons and when she goes into put the URL, she gets a message that the resource already exists.
    • Elizabeth opened a support ticket with OER Commons to try to solve the issue.
• Open Education Week Programing
  • There was a total of six success stories submitted.
  • Chris Sweet will create a more comprehensive list.
• Other Announcements
  • The American Association of Colleges and Universities launched a year-long Institute on Open Educational Resources designed for campuses aspiring to launch or expand initiatives to develop or leverage free and affordable materials in teaching and learning contexts. The virtual kick-off is July 14-15.
  • There is a virtual birthday party for the Open Textbook Library on April 14, 2-3. The OTL now includes over 1,000 open textbooks.

Next Meeting Dates and Deadlines

The next committee meeting is April 21, 2022 at 1-2:30pm.

Committee Meetings:
April 21, 2022
May 19, 2022
June 16, 2022

Deadlines: None