Open Textbooks

AtlanticOER Development Grants are intended to encourage and support educators in the Atlantic Region in the adaptation, adoption, creation, and curation of open educational resources (OER), and to increase access to course materials for students. The Canadian Association of Research Libraries (CARL) defines OERs as “free to use and openly licensed teaching and learning materials. As stated by leading open education proponent David Wiley, “‘open content’ describes a copyrightable work that is licensed in a way that ‘provides users with free and perpetual permission to engage in the 5R activities which are retain, reuse, revise, remix, and redistribute.”

Five grants of up to $2,000 each to be awarded annually. These grants are intended for individuals, departments, groups, and institutions (e.g., educators, teaching and learning centres, libraries, and OER working groups) in the Atlantic Provinces to help achieve the following objectives:

- To support the creation or adaptation of open textbooks and ancillary materials, such as PowerPoint slides, quiz banks, images, and other digital study or interactive aids
- To create a variety of OERs developed for use by educators and students in credit-bearing courses
- To establish supportive events for the development of content for OERs, such as sprints (a collaborative in-person or virtual event to create or adapt an open textbook or ancillary resources)
- To distribute funds to maximize direct benefit to a wide range of student learners and inquiry across a diversity of disciplines

Sprints, also known as events, are a collaborative in-person or virtual event to create or adapt an open textbook or ancillary resources.

Search Atlantic Canada’s collection of open textbooks and guides. You may find one ready-to-use with your learners or identify one you would like to adapt and customize for your course.