Accustomed to using textbooks, pre-developed assessments, and other standard materials in their classrooms, today's college professors are using more open educational resources (OERs) than ever. With these re-usable, non-copyrighted, curriculum materials come a few key professional development challenges. The vast quantity of resources--tested and untested alike--available online is one key hurdle. Helping instructors develop a mindset around "constant revision" and encouraging ongoing open course development are two other tricky areas that can make or break an institution's OER initiative.
Below are four professional development areas all higher education OER champions should pay attention to--and a few tips for working around the issues:
* Too many resources
* "The textbook is the course" mindset
* Educators don't have time to develop course materials
* Many faculty members don't know about OERs

Keywords

higher education · OER challenges · OER development