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Open Educational Resources (OER)

Resources for faculty, students, and administrators regarding Open Educational Resources (OER)

Copyright for OERs is covered by Creative Commons, an open alternative to traditional copyright. 

Even though some online content can be accessed for free it can still be protected under copyright which means that it can't be duplicated or edited. Copyright still exists even Under Non-Commercial Fair Use - which usually applies to a set of students enrolled in a specific course. It is important to be careful with how we use materials from the internet and to avoid copyright infringement because not everything is clearly credited. To edit or duplicate content into an open educational resource it is best to try to find content with a Creative Commons License. Please click the image below for more information on Creative Commons licensing:

Creative Commons offers a range of copyright categories:

   Attribution CC BY

This license lets others distribute, remix, adapt, and build upon an author's  work, even commercially, as long as they credit the aurthor for the original creation. This is the most accommodating of licenses offered. Recommended for maximum dissemination and use of licensed materials.

   Attribution-ShareAlike CC BY-SA

This license lets others remix, adapt, and build upon author's work even for commercial purposes, as long as they credit the author and license their new creations under the identical terms. This license is often compared to “copyleft” free and open-source software licenses. All new works based on the original will carry the same license, so any derivatives will also allow commercial use. This is the license used by Wikipedia and is recommended for materials that would benefit from incorporating content from Wikipedia and similarly licensed projects.

   Attribution-NoDerivs CC BY-ND
This license lets others reuse the work for any purpose, including commercially; however, it cannot be shared with others in adapted form, and credit must be provided to you.

   Attribution-NonCommercial CC BY-NC
This license lets others remix, adapt, and build upon author's work non-commercially, and although their new works must also acknowledge the author and be non-commercial, they don’t have to license their derivative works on the same terms.

   Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike CC BY-NC-SA
This license lets others remix, adapt, and build upon author's work non-commercially, as long as they credit the author and license their new creations under the identical terms.

   Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs CC BY-NC-ND
This license is the most restrictive of our six main licenses, only allowing others to download author's works and share them with others as long as they credit the author, but they can’t change them in any way or use them commercially.