Newsroom

Raritan Valley Community College continues to help students reduce their educational costs by providing free instructional materials in a growing number of classes. Since 2018, the use of free Open Educational Resources (OER) has saved RVCC students $5,331,803.17.

In the Fall 2024 Semester alone, students have saved more than $500,000 in textbook costs with the use of OER, which are free online resources that can be downloaded, edited, and shared. In addition to the cost savings, students benefit by using course materials that can easily be customized by their professors.

The College currently offers 70 distinct courses for which students can register to take the class with no textbook costs. When students register for classes they can see if a course has a zero-textbook cost or a low-textbook cost of less than $45. They can also search for “no cost” and “low-cost” courses as they are building their schedule.

Many faculty members are doing their part to assist students by embracing the use of OER in their classrooms.

“I want to do whatever I can to help lower the costs of my students’ education, and textbooks are a major expense. Using OER is a way I can help,” said William Klinger, RVCC Professor of Business. This summer, Professor Klinger developed an open textbook for the Principles of Management course by adapting an existing OER in Pressbooks, an open textbook authoring platform available to RVCC faculty.

According to Professor Klinger, “Pressbooks offered two big benefits. First, there were a number of Pressbooks that were freely available on the topic of management. Second, Pressbooks allows for the easy customization of texts to tailor the book to my needs. I was able to rearrange chapters to have the textbook match the sequence of the course. It was very easy to edit the book and add material and delete topics not covered in the course. I could highlight terms and concepts for students to easily recognize topics of importance. The result was a professional-looking text that was tailored to my course."

Professor Steve Schwarz, coordinator of Computer Literacy classes at the College, is adapting several existing OER and creating new materials, including assignments and videos, to develop an open textbook for the unique needs of students in that course. “Many of our students are Mac users, so all Microsoft Office assignments will have both PC and Mac videos, which is an improvement over the current commercial textbook that focuses solely on using a PC,” said Professor Schwarz.

His OER will be piloted by several faculty in the Spring 2025 Semester and rolled out to all sections of Computer Literacy in Fall 2025. Approximately 800 students take Computer Literacy each year and currently need to purchase an electronic textbook that costs more than $100. Converting this to a no-cost course will result in substantial savings for RVCC students.

When surveyed, 63% of students using OER reported that the OER improved their ability to complete assignments, and 53% report that it increased their satisfaction of the learning experience. Students said they appreciate being able to access their course materials anytime and at place they need them, and they find the OER easy to use.

For additional information about Open Educational Resources at RVCC, contact RVCC Instructional Services Librarian Megan Dempsey at megan.dempsey@raritanval.edu.

RVCC is located at 118 Lamington Road in Branchburg, NJ. For further information, visit www.raritanval.edu.

###

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

October 22, 2024

Media contact: Donna Stolzer, 908-526-1200, ext. 8383

PR #26