KBOR OER Initiatives System-wide

The KBOR OER Steering Committee distributed a survey to all public higher education institutions in Kansas.  The 2021 survey was created to gather baseline information on how Open Educational Resources (OER) are currently being implemented across the various colleges and universities in the state.  The process has been repeated annually each spring, and each annual report is linked below:

  2023 KBOR OER Survey Full Report

2022 KBOR OER Survey Full Report

2021 KBOR OER Survey Full Report

Additional Resources:

2023 KBOR OER Survey Instrument

2023 KBOR OER Survey Report Presentation

To request the raw survey data, contact This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Individual OER Initiatives

Emporia State University

In Fall 2020, ESU began awarding Course Resource Affordability Initiative Grants (CRAIG) to spur faculty adoption, adaption, compilation, and creation of open educational resources. Since Fall 2020, 44 ESU faculty have received CRAIG awards resulting in $300,000 in textbook savings for students through Spring 2022. The Student Government Association fully supports OER efforts at ESU, holding a seat on the OER Task Force since 2019 and producing resolutions in favor of OER and of CRAIG awards to spur innovation. SGA representatives sitting on the Tuition and Fees Committee unanimously approved of a $5 fee to support CRAIG funding and OER infrastructure. That fee has been approved by KBOR and will go into effect Fall 2022.

Resources: OER Resources at ESU I Course Resource Affordability Initiative Grant (CRAIG)

Membership: Open Education Network

updated 6/2022

Fort Hays State University

FHSU’s OER initiative began with AASCU’s Red Balloon Initiative for innovative teaching practices in 2007-2014. As part of the initiative, FHSU formed an Open Educational Resources Committee in 2012 under the leadership of Academic Affairs and the Office of the Provost. Today that committee is co-chaired by the Dean of the Library and the Assistant Vice Provost for Teaching Innovation and Learning Technologies (TILT). In 2017, the OER committee administered a faculty survey about perceptions of OERs. In 2019, FHSU’s Faculty Senate made a resolution in support of zero-cost course materials.

In collaboration with TILT and Technology Services, the library has offered a series of mini-conferences on open access, copyright, getting started with OERs, and advanced OERs. As of February 2020, FHSU’s executive leadership team approved a new Z-Course Initiative proposed by the OER Committee that will incentivize departments with high-enrollment courses to convert them to use zero-cost course materials. The OER Committee is currently working on implementation.

Resources: Open Textbook Grant Program | FHSU Digital Press Website | FHSU Scholars Repository | Library Guide for OER

Memberships: Open Textbook Network and SPARC

Kansas State University

Since starting in 2012, The Kansas State Open/Alternative Textbook Initiative has saved K-State Students millions by providing grants up to $5000 to instructors who replace their textbook with a resource that is free to use. These resources may be open educational resources, or alternative educational resources that are not open available for use beyond the course. In order to provide greater incentive for adoption, more recently we have introduced a $10/course fee for courses that use an open or alternative educational resource and do not require students to purchase other materials. To make these fee eligible courses easier for students to identify, we have an icon that replaces the textbook icon that normally provides information about the material required by the course.

Resources: Grant Award Application | OER Course Designation

Membership: Open Textbook Network and SPARC

Pittsburg State University

Pittsburg State’s initial interest in OER began in 2015 during the Kaleidoscope Project. At this time the OER Steering Committee was formed in a collaboration between the Provost’s Office and the Center for Teaching, Learning, and Technology. This committee is comprised of faculty and staff representatives as well as a student representative from the Student Government Association. Since its inception, the OER Steering Committee has made great strides in increasing OER awareness and adoption across campus. In 2015, a Zero Textbook Cost (ZTC) designation was added to the course schedule. In 2017, the committee began offering OpenPitt Awards for OER adoption and OpenPitt Grants for OER creation. To date, courses affiliated with the OpenPitt program have saved students over one million dollars in course materials. In 2018, OER was included in the Tenure and Promotion guidelines outlined in the KNEA/PSU contract.

Professional development for OER is also offered on the Pittsburg State campus. Library Services and the Center for Teaching, Learning, and Technology provide workshops on OER basics, locating OER, Lumen Learning, and Open Education Network training. OER faculty champions across campus have also provided sessions on Creative Commons, publishing OER, and using OER during Covid-19. Additionally, Pittsburg State has offered faculty panels on OER implementation and a roundtable discussing OER and Copyright.

Resources: Library Guide for OER  I  Pitt State Digital Commons  I  KCCTE Resource Library  I  Creative Commons Guide

updated 5/2022

The University of Kansas

The University of Kansas has been engaged in sustained support for OER since 2015, though there are examples within units that predate centralized efforts. There is an active program of outreach and advocacy based in the Libraries, which participates in the Open Education Network (OEN) and maintains a grant program, providing funding up to $5,000 for OER adopters, adapters, and creators at KU. In Spring 2019, KU Libraries launched a Textbook Heroes initiative to recognize outstanding contributions at KU. In AY 17/18, KU was accepted to the OpenStax Institutional Partner Program. In AY 18/19, Student Senate established their own initiatives, including a resolution endorsing OER and the creation of the Student Senate Textbook Affordability Award, as well as participating in statewide OER advocacy and research alongside their Regent's institution peers. In Fall 2020, with the support of Student Senate, KU began marking no-cost and low-cost courses in Enroll & Pay and classes.ku.edu, based on the excellent examples of colleagues at PSU and KSU. KU Libraries supports the use of Pressbooks for creation of OER, and in 2022 is hiring an Open Education Librarian to lead these efforts in the future.

Resources: Textbook Heroes | OER Grant Initiative | Guide to Open Educational Resources | OER at KU Handout

Memberships: Open Textbook NetworkSPARC, and OpenStax Institutional Partner Program

updated 4/2022

Washburn University

Washburn University has a nascent OER project operated by its University Libraries.  The initiative is largely information and incentive based.  Educational opportunities to learn more about OER are offered by the Open Education Librarian through Washburn’s Center for Teaching and Learning, and individualized sessions with faculty.  A small grant program, designed to incentive the adoption of OER, operated by the University Libraries was launched in summer 2019.  The Faculty Senate and Student Government of Washburn University are both interested in the role OER will play at the institution in the future.

Wichita State University

Wichita State University is committed to the use of OER, with instructional designers, university libraries, and the university bookstore all helping to promote the adoption of appropriate free resources. WSU launched the Open/Alternative Textbook (OAT) initiative in Spring 2020 to promote, incentivize, and grow the use of freely available resources in classes to reduce the economic impact of textbook costs on the student body. 

The program is based on a successful model at K-State and has two components: an OAT course designation for courses using open or alternative textbooks and a grant program to support faculty developing their own no-cost educational resources. Courses with the OAT designation have a $10 course fee, which supports the initiative. Applications for course designations and grants are reviewed by the OAT committee, which consists of stakeholders from across campus.

Resources: Open Alternative Textbook (OAT) Course Designation | OAT Textbook Grant Program

Allen Community College

Allen Community College began successfully implementing OERs in the fall of 2021 with a business course. The system wide transfer course is using an OER textbook for both onsite and online classes. Investigation into other courses that would benefit from using OER materials is ongoing. There are currently three other academic areas that are considering switching to OER textbooks.

updated 4/2022

Barton Community College

Barton Community College continues to work through a 3-year OER Plan by providing training and support for faculty to facilitate further OER course transitions. OER implementation continues throughout Barton campuses and procedures, and standards continue to be updated and refined through experience and research.

Butler Community College

Butler Community College has recently adopted or developed several OER, including texts for Composition I and Composition II. Student savings have been significant:  the composition texts are on track to save Butler students 1 million dollars in the 2020-21 academic year.  Butler’s OER work has been supported by its OER and Textbook Affordability Teams, Nixon Library, Educational Technology, Faculty Development, and Academic Departments in the form of policy and procedures, web pages, trainings, focused meetings, and two faculty development workshops, Introduction to OER and the Butler OER Development Process.  Butler also belongs to the Community College Consortium for Open Educational Resources or CCCOER.

Resources: OER Guide

Dodge City Community College

For the past 6 years, the Openstax Anatomy and physiology textbook has been used at DCCC.  Most students download it as a PDF to their computers, but some purchase a print copy through the bookstore or through Amazon.  The major reason for doing so was the textbook being used was $200 or $100 to rent for each semester, and thus, many students did not purchase it. Most students were not reading it due to the difficulty level.  

One item that has helped with costs is not an OER, but the library subscribes to films on demand, which students can access free. This allows them access to documentaries and old newsreels, as well as scientific advances.  Whether or not a professor is using partial or complete OER resources, this is a powerful resource for students.

Fort Scott Community College

Fort Scott Community College is still in the infant stages of using OERs.  The Director of Library Services has informed and promoted to educating faculty instructors on what OERs are as well as providing some links to basic OER resources.  Instructors are being encouraged to look at OERs, consider them, and use them.  Only a few courses are currently utilizing OERs in some form including Introduction to Business, Principles of Microeconomics, Principles of Macroeconomics, College Orientation, Elements of Technical Analysis, General Chemistry I, and General Chemistry II.  In addition, the Director of Library Services was appointed as a member of the Kansas Statewide OER Steering Committee.

Garden City Community College

Garden City Community College is planning OER initiatives. Early adopters among the faculty are using open textbooks and teaching materials in a variety of courses. GCCC plans to start a group to explore policy and procedures for transitioning from traditional instructional materials to OERs, and to support that transition with adequate professional development opportunities.

updated 5/2022 

Hutchinson Community College

In 2020, Hutch CC began their discovery phase of OER to introduce faculty, administration, and students to OER resources and possibilities. Since that time, numerous faculty have adopted or adapted OER for their classes, including Biology, Education, Leadership, Philosophy, Political Science, and Statistics with more instructors engaging with OER each semester. Additionally, some faculty have created their own OER materials for their courses, ranging from Genetics to Spanish to Food Science. With the explosion of interest and use of OER in both online and face-to-face classes, Hutch CC administration has begun to formalize its support of OER by developing Best Practices for Faculty and Administration, providing multiple sessions on OER during professional development weeks, and centralizing OER issues and resources within one of our institutional committees. Future plans include estimating student savings, creating a Zero-Textbook-Cost marking system, and creating asynchronous training on common OER issues such as Creative Commons licensing, writing and editing skills, and instructional re-design.

updated 5/2022

Independence Community College

Independence CC just starting to use OERs on a very limited basis.  They have about 5 instructors using them in various forms (OpenStax to self-created).  They have started a group that is exploring what, if any, policy and procedure should be followed when moving from traditional classroom materials to OERs.  They currently have a loaner program at the bookstore, so it has not been a pressing need for them.  The bookstore is exploring some potential changes and so they may be looking at this more in the next few years.  They have faculty who are early adopters who are really liking the resources and faculty who claim they will never do this, so it is still transitioning from an informational point to a practical use.  The library director started an OER resource page on the library page to support those using OERs and for students doing research.  

Current classes that are using them:

  • Psychology
  • Sociology
  • Biology
  • Some of our Math courses

Johnson County Community College

For a year and a half, JCCC has had an OER taskforce. In that time, they’ve joined and supported CCCOER and SPARC, awarded 7 mini-grants for implementation and creation, and have conducted several consultations. As they wait to see results with the mini-grants, they’ve also taken a soft survey of OER currently in classrooms, as well as made an OER curriculum option for their Comp I instructors. The activities for this year include more mini-grants, reporting out from previous ones, multiple returning sabbatical members who left to create OER, two taskforce members completing librarian and educator Creative Commons certificate programs, conference attendance, and more professional development.

Resources: Find OER | OER and Copyright

Memberships: CCCOER and SPARC

Labette Community College

Labette Community College currently uses OER materials for General Biography, Anatomy & Physiology, World Regional Geography, both US History Survey classes, Matrix Algebra, and American Government. Most of these classes will transfer directly to Kansas universities. Some other classes, particularly in chemistry and math, use instructor-written material that is provided to students at the cost of printing.

Pratt Community College

PCC is at the opening stages of working with OER with the faculty.  The VP for instruction has included into the Director of the Learning Resource Center’s responsibilities the opportunity to share the OER message and to champion it on campus. They currently have one science faculty that is experimenting with possible OER inclusion into one of her courses. They are also working to identify adequate / reasonable sources to be able to convert their Comparative World Religion class into an OER class.

The overall status is that they are in the investigative, championing and education stage.