Open Educational Resources
SUNY Online and SUNY OER Services collaborate on a variety of initiatives that leverage the resources and expertise available to faculty interested in Open Educational Resources (OER) from exploration to adoption to creation.
SUNY OER Services (SOS) operates as part of SUNY’s Office of Library and Information Services and works directly with SUNY campuses and faculty to provide assistance and knowledge to support the adoption of open educational resources and sustained use of OER as drivers of faculty choice and student success. This includes offering a ready-to-adopt course catalog, facilitating the seamless integration of openly-licensed content into learning management systems, the remixing of openly-licensed content from various sources, the offline (print) production of learning materials, as well as the services and resources of SOS partners.
Explore the menu of resources below that are available to support SUNY campus faculty. For questions related to OER or more information on any of the support resources below, contact SUNY OER Services.
Faculty Resources and Digital Courseware
SUNY OER Services (SOS) has created resources that are aligned with the SUNY Online Course Quality Rubric (OSCQR) for designing high-quality, learner-centered online courses. SOS focuses on providing structures for designing high-quality, learner-centered online courses.
SUNY OER Services partners with Lumen to provide openly available courses to use as course modules in part or in whole.
OLI Courseware
OLI and Lumen provide coordinated delivery for OLI courseware. OLI courses are now available at no cost to all SUNY students. Enjoy great support from the Lumen and SUNY OER team to help you set up and teach effectively using OLI’s learning-engineered courses.
Lumen’s Waymaker
High-touch personalized learning tools designed to strengthen metacognition and student success. These include personalized study guides and course materials aligned to outcomes.
Online Homework Manager (OHM)
Lumen’s Online Homework Manager (OHM) offers thoughtfully designed course materials faculty can customize to meet students’ needs. With thousands of interactive assessment questions, OHM empowers students in building a strong foundation in Mathematics
Lumen One
The Lumen One platform is designed for equity. Tools help create connections between students and faculty, while building a supportive peer community. Embedded resources and tools help faculty use effective teaching practices and quickly identify struggling students.
SUNY Press is an internationally acclaimed publisher of distinguished research and works of general interest. Capitalizing on the latest advances in digital communication, the Press offers an innovative range of print and electronic publications to fulfill the evolving needs of scholars, students, authors, and readers.
SUNY Press and SUNY OER Services partner to offer open access and OER textbooks.
Explore the SUNY Press catalog.
A catalog of open textbooks authored and peer-reviewed by SUNY faculty and staff.
Explore the Milne library.
Creation Platforms
A toolbox to help faculty create and publish digital content.
The SUNY Open Access Repository (SOAR) is a centrally managed online digital repository that stores, indexes, and makes available scholarly and creative works of SUNY faculty, students, and staff across SUNY campuses. SOAR serves as an open access platform for those SUNY campuses that do not have their own open access repository environments.
Pressbooks is easy-to-use book writing software that lets you create a book in all the formats you need to publish. You can use Pressbooks to publish textbooks, scholarly monographs, syllabi, fiction and non-fiction books, white papers, and more.
Lumen’s Online Homework Manager (OHM) offers thoughtfully designed course materials faculty can customize to meet students’ needs. With thousands of interactive assessment questions, OHM empowers students in building a strong foundation in Mathematics.
Torus is an open platform for developing, delivering, improving, and researching adaptive learning experiences. Torus is designed to leverage learning science while simultaneously facilitating learning research. Features include new features around onboarding students, course management, and reporting.
Professional Development
Lumen Circles Fellowships provide opportunities to connect with other faculty members as you explore effective instructional practices that support student success and apply them in your own teaching. Through the fellowship you can learn, share ideas, and develop professionally in the areas you want to grow. Lumen Circles work well for any faculty member, in any discipline, at any stage of career. You do NOT need to use courseware to be eligible for this program.
Lumen Circles Fellowships are available at NO COST to SUNY faculty and campuses.
The Open Learning Initiative (OLI) Learning Engineering Fellowship is a six-week, free of charge program designed for learning designers who are interested in enhancing their skills and knowledge for learning engineering. =
The SUNY OER Summit is a free, virtual, annual event dedicated to sharing best practices and insights in the field of Open Educational Resources and Open Pedagogy. The Summit aims to bring together practitioners from SUNY and beyond to explore innovative approaches, successful case studies, and emerging trends in OER. SUNY and non-SUNY educators, researchers, students, administrators, librarians, and other stakeholders involved in OER are welcome to participate.
Registration link updated annually.
SUNY OER maintains a community engagement group in the SUNY Microsoft Viva Engage space for collaboration, sharing and discussion. SUNY campuses are invited to join this group to connect with peers across SUNY around relevant topics in OER.
Join the SUNY OER Viva Engage Community (SUNY only)