In spring 2017, CUNY was allocated $4 million from New York State to establish, sustain, and enhance new and ongoing open educational resources (OER) and zero textbook cost (ZTC) initiatives throughout CUNY. The NYS Department of Education has subsequently provided an additional $4 million each year through 2020-21 AY. The expected result will be large-scale course redesign throughout the university.
This initiative seeks to engage faculty in the redesign of courses through the replacement of commercial textbooks with OER and other no-cost materials available online and through the Library. The short term goal is to eliminate course material costs for students, when possible, and accelerate their progress through college, but an important secondary impact is to change the culture to create systems and structures that better connect curriculum and pedagogy.
CUNY Office of Academic Affairs through the Office of Library Services will be coordinating the distribution of funds and issuing RFPs for specific initiatives. Of particular interest are proposals that target high enrollment general education classes or “Z” degrees (entire Zero Textbook Cost degree pathways).
To be eligible for the CUNY Scale-Up Initiative, CUNY colleges must commit to converting at least five courses to OER with five sections per course, and may convert up to 25 courses with five sections per course. This funding’s purpose is to develop, enhance and institutionalize new and ongoing OER initiatives across CUNY. Our goal is the establishment of CUNY as a national leader in OER.
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