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Illinois SCOERs

The Fund for the Improvement of Postsecondary Education (FIPSE) in the U.S. Department of Education has awarded a $1.08 million grant to the University of Illinois System/CARLI for Illinois SCOERs (Support for Creation of Open Educational Resources). Illinois SCOERs activities begin September 1, 2021 and extend to August 31, 2024. 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. 

The U.S. Department of Education’s Open Textbooks Pilot Program is a competitive grant program based on U.S. Senate Majority Whip and Illinois Senator Richard Durbin’s Affordable College Textbook Act. Through this grant funding, Illinois SCOERs will provide access to open textbooks and personalized learning tools for entry-level courses in high-demand health care and human development career paths.

Illinois SCOERs is a true statewide enterprise that will fundamentally change the open educational resources landscape in Illinois by providing a new holistic support model that will promote student success through OER awareness, implementation, growth, and adoption.

Read thepress release available from Senator Durbin’s web site.

About Illinois SCOERs

Illinois SCOERs (Support for Creation of Open Educational Resources) will develop, improve, and expand open educational resources by focusing in Round 1 on “The Human Condition: Care, Development, and Lifespan.” Project participants in Round 1 will create a nine open textbooks paired with ancillary materials for teachers and students.

In Round 2, Our primary focus will remain courses that fall within the theme of “The Human Condition: Care, Development, and Lifespan,” but we will also consider large enrollment courses that fall within other subject areas.

These OER will be created by work teams funded through competitive sub-grants in the focus subjects including 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, biochemistry, and other fields in the arts and humanities not mentioned here.

Illinois SCOERs will provision the creation of a new holistic support model for OER creation and use in Illinois. The value of Illinois SCOERs can best be articulated by its motto: “Student success through OER awareness, implementation, growth, and adoption.

Other 2018–2021 Open Textbooks Pilot Program Grantees

High-level outcomes of Illinois SCOERs

  1. Provide Illinois higher education students with open course materials and increase their knowledge and awareness of new OER, encouraging their widespread use, adoption, and demand.
  2. Increase CARLI member IHE faculty, staff, and students’ knowledge, skills, and attitudes about OER creation, adoption, and advocacy.

Goals and Objectives

  • Goal 1: Eliminate textbook costs for high-enrollment courses in the focus area in CARLI member institutions
    • Objective: Create accessible Creative Commons-licensed OER textbooks and associated learning objects for students, faculty, and staff. All material produced under Illinois SCOERs will be available through a Creative Commons license; the “No Derivatives” licenses will not be used since a work that cannot be altered or remixed is not an OER.
  • Goal 2: Improve student learning outcomes by increasing the use of open-source materials by including personal learning experiences
    • Objective: Collect and publish rich data about OER use for the purpose of advocacy, analysis, and planning
  • Goal 3: Develop local expertise about OER and ancillaries creation, publishing, dissemination, adoption, and use
    • Objective: Engage at least 8 CARLI member institutions in writing OER
  • Goal 4: Create a scalable OER model that can be replicated across multiple disciplines and institutions
    • Objective: Engage at least 60 CARLI member institutions in Illinois SCOERs through participation in professional development

Illinois SCOERs Round Two

CARLI is pleased to announce the conditional* availability of a second round of applications for the creation of OER. Our primary focus are courses that fall within the theme of "The Human Condition: Care, Development, and Lifespan" but we will also consider large enrollment courses that fall within other subject areas. This project will be fully funded by an additional $1 million supplemental grant to the University of Illinois System/CARLI, from the Fund for the Improvement of Postsecondary Education (FIPSE) in the U.S. Department of Education.

Call for applications for Round Two: Illinois SCOERs Sub-grants

Round Two: Illinois SCOERs Notice of Funding Opportunity

Includes Eligibility, Requirements for Applications (includes application and supporting documents, Requirements for Sub-Grant Recipients, Information on Proposal Evaluation, and Dates & Deadlines.

Timeline

CARLI recommends that interested parties fill out theIntent to Apply prior to October 3, 2022.

Completed applications, including all requested documentation for Round Two, are due November 1, 2022.

Everything Illinois SCOERs 

CARLI has created a new page where interested parties can view announcements and updates on the work being done by the sub-grant awardees. We have also created a page especially for workshops related to the creation of OER for the grant,  SCOERs Workshops will contain recordings of workshops, slides, announcements, and tips for those working on the creation of Open Educational Resources.

Round One Subgrant Recipients

Call for applications for Round 1: Illinois SCOERs Sub-grants

Round 1: Illinois SCOERs Notice of Funding Opportunity

Stay Informed

Subscribe to the Illinois SCOERs email list for project news and updates.

Project Partners

  • Illinois Community College Board
  • Illinois Board of Higher Education
  • Illinois Department of Commerce & Economic Opportunity
  • Illinois Heartland Library System
  • Reaching Across Illinois Library System
  • Illinois State Library
  • Illinois Library Association
  • Health Sciences Librarians of Illinois
  • University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign’s Division of Disability Resources and Educational Services.

Institutions applying as part of a project team will be encouraged to contribute local funds in order to maximize savings to students.

Engage CARLI member institutions in Illinois SCOERs through participation in professional development

Project Staff

The Open Illinois Project Director will work closely with the CARLI Senior Director and CARLI member library staff to identify, create, adapt, and adopt open and affordable course content at the course and program level to accommodate the evolving learning, teaching, and research needs of the diverse CARLI community. The director will coordinate the sub-grant program to member libraries. In collaboration with the CARLI membership and CARLI staff, the Open Illinois Senior Coordinator will contribute actively to the consortium's efforts around open educational resources, author rights, scholarly publishing, data management, and repositories.

  • , Principal Investigator, CARLI Senior Director
  • , Open Illinois Project Director
  • Sara Benson, Copyright Training Coordinator, Assistant Professor, Copyright Librarian, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign
  • Emily Boles, Instructional Design Coordinator and Trainer, eLearning Specialist, University of Illinois Springfield
  • Elisandro (Alex) Cabada, 3D Printing Coordinator Trainer, Assistant Professor and Medical & Bioengineering Librarian, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign
  • Ann Fredricksen, Disability Specialist, Coordinator of Accessible Media Services, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, Disability Resources and Educational Services (DRES)
  • Kathleen Ricker, Proofreader, ProofreadingPal.com Editing Services

CARLI Staff

  • Margaret Chambers, Director, Membership and Communications
  • Michelle Haake, Senior Coordinator Membership and Communications
  • Diane Day, Fiscal Officer
  • Elizabeth Clarage, Director, Collections Services and OER Committee Liaison
  • Nicole Swanson, Senior Coordinator, Library Services and Outreach and OER Committee Liaison

Advisory Committee industry-sector representatives

  • Laurie Brown, Executive Director, Hickory Point Christian Village (assisted living) and Illinois Workforce Investment Board Local 1949 Chair
  • Lisa Jones, DCEO, Manager, Office of Employment & Training (state workforce agency)
  • Suzanne Kinsey, Executive Director, Fox Valley Community Services, (in-home service agency) in DeKalb, LaSalle, Kendall, and Kane Counties
  • Danna Williamson, Nursing Education Specialist, Carle Foundation Hospital Clinical Education

OER Committee

  • Amber Burtis, Southern Illinois University Carbondale
  • Denise Cote, College of DuPage
  • Catherine Galarza-Espino, Morton College
  • Kim Hale, Columbia College Chicago
  • Daniel Matthews, Moraine Valley Community College
  • Christina Norton, Bradley University
  • Tineka Scalzo, City Colleges of Chicago
  • Janet Swatscheno, University of Illinois at Chicago
  • Chris Sweet, Illinois Wesleyan University
  • Tamara Townsend, City Colleges of Chicago

Other resources and support include training faculty and librarians at member organizations CARLI’s Open Illinois Initiative site (resources and support) CARLI’s emerging OER Commons Hub, and the Illinois Library Association legislative initiative.

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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.