Community College shares no-textbook-cost degrees
Northern Virginia Community College’s Extended Learning Institute and its partner, Lumen Learning, plan to publish 24 student courses with no textbook costs by utilising open educational resources (OER). The college believes it is the first to fully share OER degree pathways in this way, offering schools the framework for two complete degree programmes and allowing customisation based on the needs of their own institutions. The zELI courses, as they’re called, will be accessible through the Lumen Learning platform, and the company plans to offer support for schools using the courses, including faculty training, technical support, customisation abilities, LMS integration options, and guidance around OER programme design.

Students can access two complete degree programs at zero cost using OER

For colleges everywhere, offering a zero textbook cost degree program became easier as Northern Virginia Community College’s Extended Learning Institute (ELI) and open courseware provider Lumen Learning announced a collaboration to publish 24 online college courses for two complete degree programs.

All courses were developed for zero student cost using open educational resources (OER) (i.e., no textbooks, just public access internet).

NOVA says it is the first community college to fully share its OER degree pathways and courses. Building on this pioneering work, other members of the education community can map courses to their own degree requirements, adapt them to fit their own learning outcomes, and offer complete OER-based degree programs of their own.

“From the very beginning, NOVA’s efforts with OER courses and degree programs have been about both increasing student success and creating material to be shared with more educators to impact more students,” said Dr. Wm. Preston Davis, director of instructional services. “With open degree pathways, we provide a huge boost to students who can’t afford textbooks, and we put them on a clearer path towards completion. We want to see the entire education community provide this tremendous benefit.”

The courses now available through NOVA and Lumen Learning were originally developed by ELI, which has offered zero textbook cost certificates and degree programs since 2013. Now available as open, “zELI” courses (z for zero textbook cost from ELI), they fulfill all requirements for NOVA’s Certificate in General Studies, as well as associate degrees in General Studies and Social Sciences. The courses are being published with open, Creative Commons licenses, allowing anyone to freely use, revise, remix and repurpose the materials.

“NOVA has been in the vanguard of wide scale adoption of OER, and it is a significant milestone for its well-developed OER degree pathways to become openly available to the entire education community,” said Dr. Cable Green, director of global learning for Creative Commons. “NOVA and the ELI faculty are taking bold steps to show educators everywhere what is now possible with open education.”