Overview
Originally posted April 9, 2019, updated April 30, 2023.
Find additional information about OER Development Compensation at Compensation for OER Development.
In March of 2019, a brief survey was distributed to gather information regarding local compensation approaches for work related to open educational resources (OER). As OER Liaisons were interested in what others were doing, the survey was intentionally brief, gathering minimal demographic data and posing the following question:
- What information regarding compensation for OER development would you like to share?
Respondents were invited to upload or e-mail additional information, if appropriate.
Sixty-two unique responses were received from individuals at fifty of the California community colleges. Respondents were primarily OER Liaisons. In order to provide a meaningful summary of the responses, multiple responses from a given college were collapsed and an effort was made to combine like responses.
According to a document obtained from the website of the California Community Colleges Chancellor’s Office (California Community College System Grant Awards with an OER Component), at the time of this survey, forty-nine of the colleges had received no grants with an OER component. The grants that were considered in this count included those funded by AB 798 (College Textbook Affordability), AB 1602 (Zero Textbook Cost Degree), AB 1741 (California Promise Innovation Grant), and Achieving the Dream. In the event the comments of a respondent did not make the college’s funding status clear, this information was obtained from the referenced document.
Fourteen of the responding colleges (28%) indicated that they had received no OER funds. Two of the fourteen, however, had received OER-related funds per the document referenced above. It should be noted, of course, that most of the indicated funding sources were not exclusively dollars for OER and may not have been used for OER in any way. Three of the colleges that were among the 49 that did not receive any funds from these sources were providing dollars for OER either from other external grants or other funding sources. A number of the colleges indicated that they were planning to use SEA (Student Equity and Achievement) funds for OER.
While we can readily gather information regarding which colleges have and have not received funding, the more interesting and useful information pertains to how the funding was used to support faculty OER work. A number of the colleges specifically described their “tiered” funding approaches. Others offered stipends for specific tasks. Comments have been organized into different categories for your review and consideration.
This survey provides a sampling of what the colleges were doing during the 2018 – 2019 academic year, one year before the COVID-19 pandemic and and two years before the California legislature allocated $115 million to the colleges to “developand implement zero-textbook-cost degrees and develop open educational resources for courses to reduce the overall cost of education for students and decrease the time it takes students to complete degree programs”(California Education Code 78052). Hopefully this information can inform your local conversations and advocacy. As local OER efforts are further developed, and strategies implemented that are demonstrated to be effective, we look forward to facilitating the sharing of that information.
Funding Approaches
- Tiered Funding Approaches
- Specific Stipends for Specific Tasks
- AB 798 (College Textbook Affordability) Funding
- Other Comments
This page last updated April 30, 2023.