Open Education Resources (OER)

The Delaware DOE is committed to Open Education Resources. In March 2016, the Task Force on State Educational Technology released its report recommending that the Delaware Legislature support the use of open education resources as outlined below:

• Goal 6: Blended Learning to Personalize Instruction – Students and educators will have access to a statewide online virtual network that will include digital resources and data analysis capabilities to deliver blended learning to personalize instruction for students.
• Strategy 6.2 – Establish a repository as part of the statewide online virtual network with processes to develop, manage and assess instructional resources, including Open Educational Resources and expand current initiatives to include curriculum subscriptions.
• Recommendation 6.2.1 – Provide resources and personnel sufficient to build and support a statewide repository for instructional resources.

Delaware recognizes the need and a desire for a repository of quality open educational resources that have been thoroughly vetted and aligned with Delaware standards in every discipline/subject and at every level. As such, it has developed the Delaware OER Strategy to establish a process for providing these materials to Delaware educators.

The U.S. Department of Education’s #GoOpen campaign encourages states, school districts and educators to use openly licensed educational materials to transform teaching and learning. District and state leaders are working alongside innovators from education technology companies and nonprofit organizations to share effective strategies and ideas, create new tools and provide professional learning opportunities that help educators find, adapt, create, and share resources.

#GoOpen States will:

• Adopt/Implement a statewide technology strategy that includes the use of openly licensed resources as a central component.
• Develop and maintain a statewide repository solution for openly licensed resources.
• Develop the technical capability to publish OER to the Learning Registry.
• Participate in a community of practice with other #GoOpen states and districts to share learning resources and professional development resources.
• Create a webpage to share the commitment to #GoOpen and document the state’s progress.

By joining the #GoOpen campaign, the Delaware DOE has committed to actively work on accomplishing the above five items by the end of 2017. 

• Open Up (formerly K-12 OER Collaborative)
• Introduction to OER
• OER FAQ Guide
• Creative Commons 101
• License Types 

For more information on Open Education Resources, contact the Delaware Center for Educational Technology at 302-857-3305.