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Drake University - visit www.drake.edu Cowles Library

Teaching Support

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Find OER

Finding and using (i.e., adopting) existing OER materials is the easiest way to get implement OER in your courses. Once you've settled on a suitable OER, you can begin using it right away.

OER Search Tools

Cowles Library subscribes to Faculty Select, an interface on the EBSCO platform that includes:

  • texts from multiple OER and Open Access repositories;
  • Drake-owned eBooks that can be used as textbook alternatives;
  • eBooks from top academic publishers that Cowles Library can purchase for your students to use as course texts.

This short video provides an overview of how to use Faculty Select:

 

Drake University is a member of the Open Education Network, which manages the Open Textbook Library, an online catalog of academic textbooks that are free to download, print, upload to Blackboard, or revise for your courses.

In addition to the Open Textbook Library, there are a variety of other repositories and search tools that provide access to open textbooks and other course materials. Here are some of the most popular:

  • OpenStax - one of the most popular OER repositories, OpenStax provides textbooks for college as well as high school AP courses. These textbooks often include ancillary materials and can easily be adopted "as is" or edited to suit your needs.
  • OASIS - a search tool with full textbooks, modules, homework sets, A/V materials and more. If you're not ready to commit to a complete course redesign, and instead want to begin using smaller pieces of open content, OASIS is a great search tool to use.
  • LibreText - based out of UC Davis, LibreText provides access to hundreds of textbooks and courses, mostly in the sciences and social sciences.
  • Pressbooks Directory - contains thousands of OER across disciplines from institutions that use the Pressbooks publishing tool (including Drake Pressbooks).
  • B.C. Open Collection - This repository, managed by the British Columbia Campus Consortium, collects peer-reviewed textbooks from a variety of resources.
  • OER Commons - Includes open educational materials in broad subject areas. Materials include lesson plans, textbooks, activities, assessments, readings, and more.