Putting Affordable Learning Grants into action

Five CAS faculty members in four academic areas—chemistry, Spanish, humanities, and English—are creating free, open educational resources for their courses with the help of WSU Affordable Learning Grants.

By shifting from traditional textbooks to openly licensed course materials,  faculty have saved WSU students more than $1 million savings in textbook costs over the past four years. Students have also reported a very high satisfaction rate with online, affordable course materials versus traditional textbooks.

Each of the five grant recipients was awarded $4,500 to fund development of open education resources through the summer months. The faculty members also receive technical assistance through the Office of Academic Innovation and WSU Libraries.

The 2020 Affordable Learning Grant recipients are:

• Paul Buckley (Chemistry 103)
• Collin Ingram Shull (Spanish 204)
• Nora Larissa Kuster (Humanity 103, multiple campuses)
• Johanna Phelps (English 402, WSU Vancouver)
• Julie Staggers (English 402, multiple campuses)

This year’s grants were funded through the Transformational Change Initiative, which promotes student access through multiple components. More information on Affordable Learning Grants and open educational resources at WSU is available on the Office of the Provost’s website.

From WSU Insider