Open Educational Resources

This OER guide is for EMU faculty and lecturers who want to find, adopt, adapt, or create no-cost, openly licensed course materials.

What You'll Find Here

This guide introduces Open Educational Resources (OER)—teaching and learning materials that are free to use, adapt, and share. OER can reduce costs for students, increase flexibility for faculty, and improve access to knowledge.

This guide will help you:

  • Adopt OER (use materials as-is in your course)

  • Adapt OER (revise and remix existing materials)

  • Create OER (author and publish new resources)

  • Find Media (images, audio, video licensed for reuse)

Looking for library-licensed ebooks and other textbook alternatives? Visit our Library Textbook Alternatives guide

What Are OER (and Why Use Them)?

OER basics

What are OERs?

OERs are freely available teaching and learning resources that carry open licenses allowing anyone to:

Why OER?

  • Reduce student costs (national surveys show average savings of $100–$200 per course).
  • Provide equal or better learning outcomes compared to traditional textbooks (see SPARC research on OER effectiveness (opens in a new window) ).
  • Give faculty more control over content and the ability to tailor materials.

What OER Are Not

OER are different from “free” online materials and from library-licensed ebooks. While these can lower student costs, they may not allow revision or reuse. See our Library Textbook Alternatives guide for licensed resources.

  • Last Updated: Sep 29, 2025 1:23 PM
  • URL: https://guides.emich.edu/oers
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Subjects: Faculty Interest