CUOpen Announces First Grant Recipients

Thanks to the new CUOpen initiative spearheaded by Nicholas J. Schrup Library staff, five faculty members have received grants to expand the use of open educational resources at Clarke University.  

Open educational resources are materials that are in the public domain or have been released under an open license. This can include everything from full courses to sections of textbooks, lectures, or assessments. Due to the shared nature of the materials, students enjoy both a lower cost and a wider range of academic options when purchasing items for their coursework. 

“Offering students free open course materials fits with Clarke’s mission of being a compassionate and inclusive community,” said Jenny Parker, Resource and Metadata Librarian for Clarke University. “By making course materials available on day one of class, we can help contribute to student success, retention, and equity by helping to level the playing field. This helps our student’s education become more affordable, and accessible.” 

Grant awards ranged from $600 to $1,000 per project, totaling over $4,000 invested across five different disciplines. Selected projects and faculty include: 

• Patricia Braun, Biology – “Adoption and Development of an OER for Advanced Cell Biology” 
• Vapordeal Sanders, Business Administration – “Creating Support Materials for Sales Management” 
• Chrisina Bartels, Communication – “Diverse Support Materials for Videos” 
• Evelyn Nadeau, Spanish – “Researching OER Materials for Spanish Courses” 
• Tara Velez, Social Work – “Social Work with Communities & Organizations Redesign” 

Projects funded by the CUOpen program will be implemented in the 2024-2025 academic year. These projects build on a growing body of research and work from Clarke faculty pertaining to open educational resources. See the library’s page on my.clarke.edu for continuing updates.