CREATE Fellowship Program

The Course Resource Affordability for Teaching Excellence fellowship supports Bloomington faculty members to adapt and/or create their own openly licensed course materials, specifically Open Educational Resources (OER).

Fellows will develop projects that use OER, library-licensed, and/or public domain materials, and some of our Fellows will also create original openly licensed resources. The program’s purpose is to eliminate textbook costs for students while giving faculty academic flexibility to tailor their materials to their learning objectives and pedagogical preferences.

More about CREATE and OER

Goals

The Course Resource Affordability for Teaching Excellence fellowship supports instructors in their efforts to adopt and create zero-cost course materials. Instructors are provided with a stipend, the expertise of librarians and instructional technologists, and the opportunity to learn alongside their peers. Fellows are encouraged to utilize a variety of solutions and strategies to transition to zero-cost course materials. These may include Open Educational Resources (OER), library eBooks and databases, and instructor-created materials. The goals of the Course Resource Affordability for Teaching Excellence fellowship are to:

Lower the cost of college for students, contributing to their retention and progression.
Make course material access on the first day of class a reality for all students, regardless of socioeconomic status.
Encourage the development of alternatives to high-cost textbooks by supporting the adoption, adaptation, and creation of Open Educational Resources.
Support instructors in navigating the variety of affordable course materials solutions available and aggregate instructor supports across campus into one space.

Student Savings

Fellows in Progress

6 instructors
Over 600 students
Over $77,000 in cost savings in the first semester, $540,000 each subsequent academic year they continue to use their resource instead of a traditional textbook

Previous Fellows

17 instructors
Over 6,000 students
Over $300,000 in cost savings in the first semester, over $535,000 each subsequent academic year they continue to use their resource instead of a traditional textbook

Cost savings are general estimates based on instructors' predicted enrollment when applying.

Other Impact

Customized course materials that match IU instructors’ unique pedagogical goals and teaching style
Development of ancillary materials like question sets, projects, and checks for learning that complement the text without costing the student
Furthering instructors' ability to assign materials that are best suit for their course

"This has been an amazing experience for me. I’m pretty thrilled with how [my OER] turned out. I’ve got quite a bit more I want to fix, add, and update, but the students’ reviews from the spring were super-positive and I’m excited to provide the resources to others who may find them useful.”

-Rick Hullinger, 2020 Fellow, Senior Lecturer and Director of Undergraduate Instruction, Psychological and Brain Sciences

“I learned about a lot of interlocking university-based resources that, collectively, really are effectively offering alternatives to traditional for-profit publishing models. I didn't realize the extent to which the university can challenge a corporate capitalist structure.”

- 2020 Fellow

Partners

The Center for Innovative Teaching and Learning (CITL) and UITS have been core partners in CREATE. These groups offer workshops and consultations to fellows and also serve in an advisory capacity on the CMFP Implementation Group. Naz Pantaloni, Head of IU Libraries' Copyright Program, has also been an integral partner in understanding copyright, Creative Commons, and Fair Use.

Questions?

Haley Norris

Open Education Librarian

hjnorris@iu.edu