The Maricopa Millions Open Educational Resources Project
During the 2012/2013 academic year, then-Provost Dr. Maria Harper-Marinick requested that an ad-hoc team look into the possibility of consolidating and expanding the many OER projects across the District into a strategic and systemic district-wide initiative. Their vision, the Maricopa Millions Open Educational Resources (MMOER) Project is intended to reduce educational costs for students while providing immediate and permanent access to learning resources. Spending less money on textbooks and materials fosters greater access to materials for students, which may enable them to stay on track with completing their courses.
The Maricopa Millions OER Project includes developing a strategic, sustainable OER infrastructure that includes awareness, professional development, OER development, and technical support, marketing, and technical structure. In order for OER to be successful at MCCCD, in 2013 an OER strategic planning and implementation team was established, under the leadership of Lisa Young, Paul Golisch, and Alisa Cooper. Maricopa Millions is now an ongoing initiative led by the OER Steering Team, a district-wide committee that strives to include representatives from every sector of the institution and from each of the colleges. The team is led by co-chairs Matthew Bloom (SCC English Faculty and Faculty-in-Residence OER Coordinator) and Sian Proctor (SMCC Geology, Sustainability, & Planetary Science Faculty).
Over the project's initial five years, Maricopa Millions estimates that faculty across the district have saved students over $11 million in textbook costs by choosing to use low-cost/no-cost materials instead of costly traditional textbooks.
Get Involved with OER!
Open Educational Resources promise not only to save students money and guarantee immediate and permanent access to quality educational materials but also to transform the way we involve our students in the curation and creation of knowledge. As the ever-changing open education movement continues to grow worldwide, Maricopa is committed to maintaining its role as an early innovator by supporting faculty adoption and content development.
To learn more about Open Educational Resources, explore the self-paced OER Faculty Workshop in Maricopa Canvas: https://learn.maricopa.edu/enroll/G37FCW. The course is also available at https://www.canvas.net/ (the public Canvas MOOC site) by searching for "Making the Transition to Open."
For more information about previous Maricopa Millions grants, please consult our Canvas site.
