ALLIANCE, Ohio — Two University of Mount Union faculty members were recently awarded the Ohio Library and Information Network (OhioLINK) Course Redesign Grants to aid in teaching with Open Education Resources (OER), which are high quality, adaptable course materials that do not cost anything for students to use.  

Dr. Gwen Gray Schwartz, professor of English, and Mathew Erickson, lecturer of business, were two of the 29 faculty members across Ohio who received these grants. They will utilize these funds as part of their Introduction to Creative Writing and Quantitative Methods for Business courses, respectively.

“Buying textbooks for college courses impacts the affordability of attending college,” said OhioLINK Executive Director Amy Pawlowski. “Our OhioLINK Course Redesign Grants acknowledge that faculty may need extra support to make use of viable no-cost teaching materials in order to help students save money.” 

The OhioLINK Affordable Learning Open Course Redesign Grants program is a pilot program funded by the Ohio Technology Consortium (OH-TECH) and the Midwest Higher Education Compact (MHEC). Its purpose is to help faculty learn more about using no-cost course content while also assisting them with redesigning their syllabi. OhioLINK awarded more than $17,000 as part of this initiative.

According to OhioLINK, the Affordable Learning OER Course Redesign Grant funds faculty participation in a three-week training course on OERs and provides a personalized review of their course syllabus to identify OER and/or library resources that meet the instructor’s learning objectives. After completing the OER training course, instructors will be able to use at least one open-licensed or library-licensed resource as early as fall semester 2022.

Mount Union is one of 88 OhioLINK member higher education institutions that benefits from the shared digital resources it provides. More information can be found at ohiolink.edu.