Evaluate Open Educational Resources Research Guides At University

Bonisiwe Shabane

-Oct 31, 2025, 5:55 AM

evaluate open educational resources research guides at university

Similar to commercial educational materials, the quality of OER can vary and requires some time investment to evaluate the resource. Several OER providers offer assistance with evaluation through peer-review guidelines and user reviews. You can learn more about the quality and impact of OER through freely available research articles. Commercial textbooks can include errors, inaccuracies, or biases and can take years for un updated edition to be released, if ever; whereas, any errors or problems found in an OER can be immediately fixed. Below is an example of a particularly problematic commercial nursing textbook that reinforced stereotypes of racial, ethnic and religious groups. OERs can be evaluated using similar standards and criteria used for assessing traditional commercial textbooks.

Affordable Learning Georgia has a useful guide for evaluating open educational resources. Criteria they recommend considering when beginning to assess OER include: Clarity, Comprehensibility, and Readability Once you've found a resource that seems relevant, it's important to consider if it's right for your students and your course; to evaluate whether the content is relevant, accurate, and inclusive; and to determine... This page features resources that offer methods and considerations for evaluating OERs. For additional help, particularly guidance on instructional design or accesibility, please contact the Faculty Resource Center at frc@uccs.edu.

Evaluating OER can be time-consuming. It involves comprehensive checks of subject matter, an understanding of course and object alignment, as well as some technical knowledge. This process may involve multiple evaluators including instructional designers, librarians, and subject matter experts (SMEs). Many tools have been developed to help educators with the evaluation process and ensure the OER objects they use and create are accurate and accessible. This page covers questions to ask and tools for help with evaluating OER. Adapted from "Evaluate OER" by Abbey Elder, Iowa State University Library under a Creative Commons License CC BY 4.0

UNM has developed it's own Faculty Guide to support your learning about OER, where you will find information about Evaluating OER Resources. Head over to the OER Grant Program Libguide for information about how the New Mexico OER Consortium can support your work. Review the license assigned to the work. With a CC license, an author may grant you a combination of rights: to freely copy, freely redistribute, freely transform, or freely reuse your work. Learn more about CC licenses on our guide and review the Creative Commons FAQ for licensees. Consider the format of the work and the ease with which you might remix, edit, or revise.

Review the chapter Assess Editability from Modifying an Open Textbook. Consider the logic and clarity of the topic organization. Consider if the language and sequencing will be comprehensible to learners. Consider if the text is inclusive of a variety of worldviews, races, cultures, ethnicities, and backgrounds. Consider the course and learners that will use the OER. Ask if the content is appropriate for learners and teachers in higher education.

With so many freely available resources online, choosing OER can be overwhelming. This checklist contains some suggestions for faculty when choosing resources for use in the classroom. RELEVANCE From Faculty Guide for Evaluating Open Education Resources by BCCampus licensed under a CC BY 4.0. Material in this guide is reused and adapted with permission from the OER guide by the Office of Information Literacy at University Library, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Here are a few steps you might take in the evaluation process.

If this process seems lengthy, think about the process you follow to review textbooks and other materials for your course. You can use a similar or modified evaluation process to that. You’ve found an OER. Congrats! Now you should go through a quick evaluation process to determine whether it’s right for your purposes. Research the following in your evaluation process.

Also keep track of what might need to be improved so you can enhance the OER for your own purposes. Note: This resource was reused and adapted from Kirkwood Community College Library's guide on open textbooks. It was developed by Sarah Crissinger, Information Literacy Graduate Assistant. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. Note: This rubric is a synthesis version of the eight (8) separate rubrics for the evaluation of OERs created by ACHIEVE.org. It is meant as a ready reference for quick evaluation of an OER.

It was created and shared by Rodney Birch of George Fox University. You'll likely find it useful to evaluate OER based on the same standards you use to evaluate other course materials. Here are a few criteria to consider: Content: Does this OER cover what you'd like your students to learn in the course? Appropriateness: Is the content and reading level at the right level for your students? Is it challenging enough?

Is the level of technicality appropriate for your course? Accessibility: Are materials available in a format compatible with screen readers or other technology? Are chapters and sections organized using headings? Do images contain alternative text? Do videos include captions and/or transcripts? Diversity and Inclusion: Is the content inclusive of students represented in your course?

Is material diverse in regard to age, ability, race, ethnicity, gender, sexuality, geography, socio-economic status, and more? This diagram illustrates the value in considering the different roles that exist in the production and use/re-use of OERs and to highlight the importance of considering end users. Because OERs may vary in quality, it is important for instructors to carefully evaluate them before posting them in their classroom. Although there is not yet a standard checklist that’s been developed for this purpose, many of the criteria listed in this checklist can also be used to evaluate OERs. The criteria include: Consider taking these steps to evaluate OER, or follow the process you typically use to evaluate textbooks and other course materials.

Instructors planning to use OERs in their courses should also keep in mind that the OERs should comply with federal and state accessibility requirements. A checklist for compliance with Section 508 of the Americans with Disabilities Act can be found here. Many content creators apply Creative Commons licenses that allow users to remix, revise, and share their content. These resources discuss considerations for modifying and giving attribution for Creative Commons works. Interested in learning about the Franklin University Library's etextbook program? See our Affordable Learning @ Franklin University Guide for information about Franklin University's affordable learning program, how to request a library etextbook, and troubleshooting textbook access issues.

Just as with any other materials you may use, you must evaluate the validity and usefulness of OER based on your knowledge and experience. Here are some resources to help: Here are some questions to consider when thinking about the adoption of Open Educational Resources: Open Education Resources can vary in quality and it is important to take time to carefully evaluate them before use. Below are some criteria to consider when considering OER for the classroom:

Evaluate Open Educational Resources Research Guides At University

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