Open access implies access for all. If learning materials are not accessible for each and every student, do they fulfill the purpose of OER?
Accessibility means that all students can learn from print and digital content, participate in all learning activities, and interact without hindrances. If you find OER that you are interested in using in your course(s), we encourage you to take the time to check for accessibility.
BC Campus Open Education has created an in-depth guide and toolkit to help you assess the accessibility of OER. Although the Toolkit was designed to guide OER creators to create open and accessible textbooks, you can use the guide to learn more about OER accessibility, and to evaluate the OER you are considering adopting for your course(s). There is also a handy checklist at the end of the Toolkit for you to use (and remix!) for your own purposes.
OER Bootcamp 3-4: OERs and Accessibility
Review this 11 minute video on how accessibility for disabled users applies to OER:
Vetting OER for Cultural Relevance, Accessibility and Licensing
For more modeling of accessibility in OER across the United States, view below. This recording from a 1 hour webinar hosted by members of the Open Education Consortium highlights best practices and rubrics developed to ensure that OER content meets instructional material standards, accessibility guidelines, and open licensing policies.
More on Accessibility
W3C Accessibility Standards
This site, from the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), shares the formal standards for designing and developing accessible web content. The initiatives behind this site aim to provide access for all, including those with disabilities.
WebAim: WAVE Web Accessibility Evaluation Tool
The WebAim site has extensive resources on screen readability and accessibility. This specific page enables you to enter a URL to check on the accessibility of a web-based resource.
The content of this course is adapted from the following works:
- “Find OER” by Open Professionals Education Network, licensed under CC BY 4.0
- “OER 101” by David Rose, American University, licensed under CC BY 4.0
- “Evaluating OERs” by Duke Library at Furman University, licensed under CC BY 4.0 / A derivative from the original work
- “Adopt OER” by Open Education Consortium, licensed under CC BY 4.0
- How to attribute Creative Commons licensed Materials by National Copyright Unit, Copyright Advisory Groups (Schools and TAFEs) licensed under CC BY 4.0
- “Open Attribution Builder” by Open Washington, SBCTC licensed under CC BY 4.0
- “Types of OER” by Montgomery College, licensed under CC BY 4.0
Unless otherwise noted, this work is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.