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Round 2 Sub-Grant Application Notice of Funding Opportunity

On October 1, 2021, the University of Illinois System and the Consortium for Academic and Research Libraries of Illinois (CARLI), was awarded a three-year, $1.08 million Open Textbooks Pilot grant, “Illinois SCOERs: Support for the Creation of Open Educational Resources,” funded entirely from the Fund for the Improvement of Postsecondary Education (FIPSE) in the U.S. Department of Education. From this funding, CARLI awarded nine competitive sub-grant awards, each with a maximum of $60,000, to Governing Member libraries to support the creation of Open Educational Resources (OER) for courses that focus on “The Human Condition: Care, Development, and Lifespan.” 

In May 2022, CARLI was notified that approximately $1 million in additional funds will be awarded to CARLI in calendar year 2022 from FIPSE and the Open Textbooks Pilot grant. CARLI will support a second round of applications for at least eight competitive sub-awards, each with a maximum of $60,000, to Governing Member libraries to support the creation of OER. Our main focus area remains courses that fall within the theme of “The Human Condition: Care, Development, and Lifespan.” However, we have been given permission to expand the call to consider OER and/or ancillary materials created for large enrollment courses that fall within other subject areas.

The primary goal of CARLI’s Illinois SCOERs is to encourage and support the creation and use of OER by CARLI Governing Member institutions to positively impact students in Illinois. An additional goal is that through training and advising, CARLI will work with awardees to build and foster OER expertise across the state, including the incorporation of 3D printing as a pedagogical tool.

The rising cost of textbooks is a significant barrier to student success and learning. Illinois SCOERs seeks pedagogically innovative projects to create and adapt open textbooks and accompanying ancillary materials, including the use of 3D printing as a tool to enhance the learning experience. Through evidence-based practices, these OER will implement high-impact, culturally relevant, inclusive, collaborative projects in support of open education and reduced textbook costs in courses that address the focus area and beyond.

CARLI will award a minimum of eight sub-grants as part of Illinois SCOERs in Round 2. Each applicant team may request a maximum of $60,000. Awarded teams will create, adapt, and/or update OER and ancillary materials for their courses. Each team of awardees will receive a 3D printer and consumables; and CARLI will provide guidance for creating pedagogically based 3D printing assignments. Teams will be responsible for teaching with the grant created OER and ancillary materials as well as collecting data regarding OER adoption and usage in the classroom; CARLI will report this data to the U.S. Department of Education, a requirement of this three-year grant.

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The contents of this web page were developed under a grant from the Fund for the Improvement of Postsecondary Education, (FIPSE), U.S. Department of Education. However, those contents do not necessarily represent the policy of the Department of Education, and you should not assume endorsement by the Federal Government.

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Sub-grant applications (“application”) are invited from CARLI Governing Members. Application teams (“workgroups”) can include institutions that are not CARLI Governing Members; however, the lead institution must be a CARLI Governing Member. CARLI strongly encourages but does not require multi-institutional collaboration so that the project will impact the largest number of students in Illinois.

Each applicant workgroup will mirror the team assembled at CARLI and must include:

  • One librarian/library staff member who will serve as sub-grant coordinator,
  • At least one subject matter specialist or author,
  • One instructional designer,
  • One 3D printing coordinator,
  • One copyright coordinator,
  • One accessibility coordinator,
  • One proofreader, and
  • One industry/sector representative.

Please note that one person can be identified to fulfill multiple roles within the workgroup, but not all roles. Also, note that we are not expecting each person to be an expert in the role they are assigned. Illinois SCOERs seeks to develop expertise statewide by providing training to CARLI Governing Member faculty and staff. Our team at CARLI will provide support and training to help ensure the development of knowledge and skills necessary to build a vibrant OER community for CARLI Governing Members.

Primary consideration will be given OER proposals that address introductory-level courses related to “The Human Condition: Care, Development, and Lifespan.” Subject areas include but are not limited to: health, health information management, nutrition, microbiology, immunobiology, genetics, laboratory skills, audiology, radiology, dental, child development, developmental psychology (and disorders), personality, nursing, sport, therapy (massage, physical, occupational), occupational safety, social work, counseling, speech/communication development and pathology, EMT, human sexuality, social psychology, and biochemistry. 

At this time, we will also consider proposals for OER and/or ancillary materials created to replace high-textbook-cost in high-enrollment courses in any subject area. The same criteria for evaluation will apply, such as the number of students impacted, the cost of textbooks, how often the course is taught, how many institutions are involved, etc. 

Interested parties can fill out an intent to apply.

 

The application and list of supporting materials can be found here. PDF version

Each workgroup must submit one complete application packet which proposes OER and ancillary creation within the focus area. As specified in the Round 2 Sub-Grant Application Packet Instructions, each packet must:

  • Describe the project in detail, including a timeline, budget and budget justification.
  • Identify workgroup members. Multi-institutional collaboration among CARLI Governing Members is preferred but not required.
  • Cite and describe any OER that will be used as a starting point in the project, or document that existing resources are not available to meet your learning objectives.  
  • Provide information about the course(s) for which the OER will be used, explain course competencies and learning outcomes.
  • Notify relevant institutional units that will receive and distribute the grant funds about this application.
  • Secure a letter(s) of support from your department chair, dean, or person in a similar role who is responsible for assigning courses. The purpose of the letter is to verify that if you receive the grant, you or a designated alternate will be assigned to teach the redesigned course using the new OER at least one time before June 30, 2025. Projects that will be adopted by multiple institutions must secure a letter from each institution.

1 Good places to start this research include CARLI Open-Ed Resources, Open Textbook Library, and OER Commons. Contact a librarian at your local institution if you need help with your search.

  • Workgroups will collaborate with CARLI to develop a timeline of deliverables, payment schedule, and gather impact data.
  • Workgroups will create or substantially revise/remix an open textbook and/or ancillary materials. A 3D printing assignment must be one of the ancillary materials that is created. Other ancillaries could include teacher guides, study guides, self-assessments, quizzes, tests, presentation slides, multimedia content, learning activities, flashcards.
  • All work must employ evidence-base content and practices. It must fulfill core competencies and requirements of its subject area. Additionally, we are seeking projects that encourage students to engage:
  • Intellectual Reasoning and Knowledge 
  • Creative Inquiry and Discovery
  • Effective Leadership and Community Engagement 
  • Social Awareness and Cultural Understanding 
  • All deliverables including the ancillaries must have a Creative Commons BY 4.0 license https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ so that others can easily adopt and reuse.
  • Report your OER adoption to your campus bookstore (or equivalent) before the deadline for Higher Education Opportunity Act (HEOA) reporting.
  • At least one section of your course will be taught using the OER and course materials created with the grant before June 30, 2025 (pending a one-year grant extension for CARLI). If you cannot guarantee that you will be teaching before June 30, 2025, you must identify an alternate who will commit to using the OER at your institution in advance. If possible, we would prefer more than one semester of OER use, but given our time constraints we realize this may not be possible.
  • Awardees must commit to using the textbook for three years, or a minimum of six semesters.
  • Workgroups will submit on-time quarterly reports on the status of the project and OER adoption.
  • Provide needed updates to OER materials for three years following the grant.
  • Provide data to CARLI as specified by the Project Director, including previous course enrollment numbers, textbook costs, and pass/fail/drop rates.  
  • Collect feedback from students on their experiences taking an OER course.
  • Help to publicize your work and become an advocate for OER by providing CARLI with press-worthy updates; presenting webinars, workshops, and professional meetings; or giving a presentation to your department colleagues.
  • Share the resources adapted/created to accessible repositories: CARLI’s OER Commons Hub, LibreTexts, and the Open Textbook Library. The OER must be made available for printing through XanEdu.
  • Student savings during grant period (through June 30, 2025) compared to grant amount
  • Comprehensiveness and clarity
  • Content accuracy and relevance to the field
  • Adaptive learning activities and course design that consider accessibility, universal design, and user experience
  • Creative pedagogy
  • Modularity and adaptability
  • Appropriateness of the ancillary materials
  • Department commitment (for example, redesign all sections of a class or all classes in a sequence)
  • Applications that address issues of diversity, equity, and inclusion
  • Additional consideration will be given for OER that feature inter-institutional (community college, public university, private college/university) collaboration.
  • Diversity of institutions involved and the populations they serve
  • Courses where fewer OER are currently available
  • Feasibility of project as proposed
  • Equitable distribution of funds statewide
  • Completely new OER will be given priority over OER that are remixed/adapted.
CATEGORY EXAMPLE
Author – Create a substantially new OER where it is possible to demonstrate that quality resources are not currently available to meet learning objectives. Review available open content for your SOCIOLOGY course. Determine that none of the existing OER for this subject area meets the needs of your students. Collaborate with others to write or write your own course materials to support your learning objectives, tailored to your own students and pedagogical approach. Create ancillary materials, including a 3D printing assignment.
Revise/Remix – Update existing OER with major revisions or develop custom course content from multiple open educational resources and original open content in order to support learning objectives not met by existing open resources. Redesign your ANATOMY 101 course, making use of open educational resources that currently exist such as (insert sample books). Significantly revise each chapter to include new features and combine/ write new chapters to cover learning objectives for your course not supported by the original book. Create ancillary materials, including a 3D printing assignment.
Ancillary Creation - Create Ancillary materials to accompany an OER text that you have created or are already using in your class. Create all new ancillary materials for an existing OER that does not have any associate with it. These ancillaries must be substantive and include a 3D printing assignment.

Applications will be evaluated by a sub-grant review committee approved by the CARLI Board of Directors composed of CARLI Open Illinois staff, CARLI Governing Members, and industry representatives.

2022  
June 25 Applications available
September 6 Informational session about the application process from 2-3:30 p.m. Register to attend.
September 15 Informational session about the application process from 1:30-3:00 p.m. Register to attend.
September 19 MeetGreetCollaborate session to find potential collaborators from 3:00-4:00 p.m. Register to attend.
September 26 MeetGreetCollaborate session to find potential collaborators from 3-4:00 p.m. Register to attend.
September 28 Informational session about the application process from 2-3:30 p.m. Register to attend.
October 3 Interested parties should fill out an Intent to Apply
November 1 Application deadline (mail all documents to )
November 1 Scoring of applications begins
December 2 Review committee meets
2023  
January 13 Announcement of Round 2 Recipients
January-April OER and ancillary materials creation begins as soon as all paperwork is processed
March 28 Workgroups submit structured outline to the Advisory Committee
March-April Specialized training with workgroups (e.g., timelines, deliverables, copyright, instructional design, 3D printing coordinators)
June 16 Workgroups submit summary of work update to Project Director
August-September First draft will be submitted for review
September-October OER sent out for peer review
November Workgroups complete final edit
November-December OER and ancillaries published with Creative Commons licensing
November-December OER/ancillaries uploaded to various OER sites, including Open Illinois and the OER Commons Hub
December 1 Workgroups submit summary of work update to Project Director
December OER and ancillaries ready for course adoption
2024  
January Adopt OER
March 1 Workgroups submit summary of work update to Project Director 
  Collect data as required by the U.S. Dept. of Education
  Submit quarterly reports
2024-2025  
August-May Continue teaching with OER
  Collect data as required by the U.S. Dept. of Education
  Submit quarterly reports

*Project timelines may vary depending on the amount of original material needed.

For more information visit our project website

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