SPSCC Library: Open Education Guide: Find OER

OER repositories, reviews, courses, textbooks, and journals

This tab highlights large repositories of OER and/or freely available resources in multiple subject areas or disciplines.

OER Commons
OER Commons is a dynamic digital library and network. Explore open education resources and join our network of educators dedicated to curriculum improvement. With a single point of access from which they can search, browse, and evaluate resources, including textbooks, lessons, videos, and more, in OER Commons’ growing collection.
MERLOT II
MERLOT is a curated collection of free and open online teaching, learning, and faculty development services contributed and used by an international education community. MERLOT does not house content, but is a collection of links to other content. One of the biggest OER repositories, but a bit unwieldy and difficult to search. Use limiting options on the left side of results page.
Open Textbook Library
Hundreds of complete, open college-level textbooks. Many include peer-reviews.
Pressbooks Directory
Searchable directory of OER textbooks developed by institutions and educators using the Pressbooks platform.
LibreTexts
Multi-institutional repository via California State Univ. and MERLOT for OER web-based collections -- texts, exercises, and more -- for Chemistry, Biology, Geosciences, Mathematics, Statistics, Physics, Social Sciences, Engineering, Medicine, Business, Photosciences, and Humanities.
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Most content is under a CC BY NC SA 3.0 license
SkillsCommons
The US Department of Labor’s Trade Adjustment Assistance Community College and Career Training (TAACCCT) program has created a free and open online library called SkillsCommons containing free and open learning materials and program support materials for job-driven workforce development. The Open Educational Resources (OER) are produced by community colleges across the nation and can be found, reused, revised, retained, redistributed and remixed by individuals, institutions, and industry.
Teaching Commons
Open educational resources from colleges and universities. Part of the Digital Commons Network. Includes search box for keywords searching; also browsable by Institution, Type, and Subject Area.
Open Case Studies
A project by the University of British Columbia that presents case studies in various disciplines, including Business, Civil Engineering, Conservation, Digital Literacy, Economics, Education, Forestry, Inclusive Practices, Land & Food Systems, Law, Political Science, Public Policy & Global Affairs, Social Justice, and Soil Science. Mostly Canadian examples. Except where otherwise noted, content is licensed CC BY (Creative Commons - Attribution).

This tab includes sites and repositories that include peer reviews and/or accessibility reviews of OER texts and course materials.

Open Textbook Library
Hundreds of complete, open college-level textbooks. Many include peer-reviews.
BC Campus Open Ed - List of Reviewed Textbooks
BC Campus Open Ed List of Accessible Textbooks
List of accessible OER textbooks on the BC Campus Open Ed repository site, which meet the requirements of the BC Campus Accessibility Checklist.
Cool4Ed - Course Showcase
The California Open Education Resources Council facilitates the peer review of open textbooks which are showcased in the California Open Source Digital Library (COOL4Ed). Choose a discipline, course, and then look for the "accessibility reviews" column.

This tab highlights collections of OER courses, many of these are from specific state or institution sites.

General or multi-institution:

Lumen Learning Open Courses
Open courses in different subject areas and degree programs.
Lumen Learning courses - Achieving the Dream institutions
This catalog contains openly-licensed course materials developed for the Open Educational Resources (OER) Degree Initiative, led by Achieving the Dream. Lumen maintains this content in the same condition it was provided by participating faculty and institutions. Except where otherwise noted, all material is licensed under a CC BY license.
LibreTexts
Multi-institutional repository via California State Univ. and MERLOT for OER web-based collections -- texts, exercises, and more -- for Chemistry, Biology, Geosciences, Mathematics, Statistics, Physics, Social Sciences, Engineering, Medicine, Business, Photosciences, and Humanities.
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Most content is under a CC BY NC SA 3.0 license
Saylor Courses
List of openly licensed courses created by Saylor.org
Academic Earth
Collection of online courses and video lectures from 25 universities including MIT, Harvard, Yale, Stanford, Berkeley and Princeton.

State-specific:

Open Course Library - Washington SBCTC
A collection of course materials for high-enrolled courses in Washington state's community and technical colleges. All content is stored in Google docs. Note that some courses have openly licensed ancillary materials but require low-cost textbooks.
Cool4Ed - Course Showcase
The California Open Education Resources Council facilitates the peer review of open textbooks which are showcased in the California Open Source Digital Library (COOL4Ed). Choose a discipline, course, and then look for the "accessibility reviews" column.

Institution-specific:

SUNY OER Courses
Online OER courses created by State University of New York (SUNY) in the subjects of Arts, Business, English/Communication, Mathematics, Natural Science, Social Science, Technology, and Transitional Studies.
Open Learning Initiative (OLI) courses - Carnegie Mellon University
Content is CC BY NC SA licensed. Most courses have an open + free version (click "Enter course" to access)
ROAM @ Penn State: Repository of Open and Affordable Materials
Online OER courses developed at Penn State, with a particular emphasis on OER in the energy, environmental, sustainability, and geography course areas.
UCI Open Courses
Open collections and courses from University of California, Irvine. "UCI Open is an open education project supporting the needs of learners and educators everywhere: on our campus, within California, throughout the United States, and the entire world. "

This tab highlights collections of OER textbooks, many of which come from state or institution-specific sites.

An open textbook is an openly-licensed textbook offered online by its author(s). The open license sets open textbooks apart from traditional textbooks by allowing users to read online, download, or print the book at no additional cost.

For a textbook to be considered open, it must be licensed in a way that grants a baseline set of rights to users that are less restrictive than its standard copyright. A license or list of permissions must be clearly stated by the author. (Source: Varied Characterizations of Open Textbooks by Open Access Textbooks)

General or multi-institution:

OpenStax
View and share free educational material in small modules that can be organized as courses, books, reports or other academic assignments.
Open Textbook Library
Hundreds of complete, open college-level textbooks. Many include peer-reviews.
BC Campus Open Collection
Curated collection of open textbooks and courses, many reviewed by British Columbia faculty.
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Old site at https://open.bccampus.ca/find-open-textbooks/
Pressbooks Directory
Searchable directory of OER textbooks developed by institutions and educators using the Pressbooks platform.
Rebus Community - Catalog of OER Textbooks
OER textbooks from Rebus Community projects.
Wikibooks
A project of the Wikimedia Foundation, this collection of group written textbooks in a variety of sources follows rules similar to Wikipedia.
Directory of Open Access Books (DOAB)
The primary aim of DOAB is to increase discoverability of Open Access books.

State-specific:

Open Oregon Adoption List
Listing of course materials that Oregon community college and university instructors are using to reduce textbook costs in their courses.
OpenALG
Affordable Learning Georgia's new site for open and interactive educational resources. This site turns the OER texts funded by ALG into interactive e-textbooks. E-textbooks include downloadable source files.
Galileo Open Textbooks
List of all open textbooks available through the Affordable Learning Georgia initiative
OER Texas Repository
Explore collections of open educational resources created and shared by Texas higher education.

Institution-specific:

University of Hawaii OER
Collections of OER across the curriculum, including Arts and Humanities, Business, Food Science and Nutrition, Education, Languages and Literature, Medicine/Health, Natural Sciences, and Social Sciences.
PDX Open: Open Access Textbooks
Open access textbooks developed by Portland State University faculty.
ZTC Textbooks - College of the Canyons
Zero-cost textbooks used by College of the Canyons, organized by discipline
University of Minnesota Open Textbooks and Monographs
Collection of open textbooks and open access monographs published by the University of Minnesota Libraries Publishing.

K-12 / Adult Education:

CK-12
CK-12 is probably the biggest open content provider for K-12 STEM content. CK-12 provides standards-aligned teaching resources. Content is mapped to a variety of levels and standards, including common core.
CommonLit
Literature resource with "over 2,000 high-quality free reading passages for grades 3-12, complemented by aligned interim assessments, growth-oriented data, and expert-led teacher development." Also includes a digital Spanish library for grades 3-10. Some texts are in the public domain and freely viewable, while others require educators to create a free log-in account to view and use.
CTE Online Curriculum
Lesson plans and curriculum for CTE and K-12 courses. Does require a free log-in to access full resources. Butte County Office of Education and California Dept. of Education. Content on this site has a CC BY NC SA license.
EdTech Books
Collection of free, open access, and openly licensed books in education, educational technology, and instructional design. Also includes textbooks for writing and ESL, and more. Online and PDF download options. Each resource has licensing/terms of use info.

Humanities/Writing/Research:

Project CORA (Community of Online Research Assignments)
An open access resource for faculty and librarians. It is intended to be a collaborative space for adapting and experimenting with research assignments and sharing the success or lessons learned so that others may benefit. The database contains multiple, reliable and reproducible research assignments.
WAC Clearinghouse
Writing Across the Curriculum (WAC) Clearinghouse includes books, journals, and other resources to support this approach to composition studies. Materials are are freely available. Most carry a Creative Commons Non-commercial No-derivatives license, which means you are free to link to and print these materials, however, you cannot revise without permissions from the authors.
CommonLit
Literature resource with "over 2,000 high-quality free reading passages for grades 3-12, complemented by aligned interim assessments, growth-oriented data, and expert-led teacher development." Also includes a digital Spanish library for grades 3-10. Some texts are in the public domain and freely viewable, while others require educators to create a free log-in account to view and use.

Languages:

Español abierto (OER repository for Spanish)
Online repository for Spanish language instructional OER. All resources posted on this site carry CC licenses.
Coerll - Center for Open Educational Resources & Language Learning
The Center for Open Educational Resources & Language Learning (COERLL) is one of 16 National Foreign Language Resource Centers (LRC's) funded by the U.S. Department of Education. The overall mission of these federally-funded centers is to improve the teaching and learning of foreign languages by producing resources (materials and best practices) that can be profitably employed in a variety of settings.

Prof/Tech:

SkillsCommons
The US Department of Labor’s Trade Adjustment Assistance Community College and Career Training (TAACCCT) program has created a free and open online library called SkillsCommons containing free and open learning materials and program support materials for job-driven workforce development. The Open Educational Resources (OER) are produced by community colleges across the nation and can be found, reused, revised, retained, redistributed and remixed by individuals, institutions, and industry.
CTE Online Curriculum
Lesson plans and curriculum for CTE and K-12 courses. Does require a free log-in to access full resources. Butte County Office of Education and California Dept. of Education. Content on this site has a CC BY NC SA license.

Science:

AMSER (Applied Math & Science Education Repository)
A portal of educational resources and services built specifically for use by those in Community and Technical Colleges but free for anyone to use
MERLOT Virtual Labs
Growing collection of free virtual labs, experiments, and simulations used in teaching the science, technology, engineering, and math disciplines in higher education.
IntechOpen Books
Site of open access books "built by scientists, for scientists." Books are peer-reviewed and edited. Browse by subject or search for specific keywords.

Technology:

IntechOpen Books
Site of open access books "built by scientists, for scientists." Books are peer-reviewed and edited. Browse by subject or search for specific keywords.
EdTech Books
Collection of free, open access, and openly licensed books in education, educational technology, and instructional design. Also includes textbooks for writing and ESL, and more. Online and PDF download options. Each resource has licensing/terms of use info.

This tab highlights sites of materials in the public domain.

Public domain means there is no copyright attached to these materials. This term can refer to both historical resources whose copyright has expired as well as to modern works whose creators have released their materials into the public domain and waived copyright.

Books:

Project Gutenberg
Find the full text of classics and public domain works from the first massive ebook-creating organization in existence. Nothing fancy here, just files with the full text.
Standard Ebooks
"The Standard Ebooks project is a volunteer driven, not-for-profit effort to produce a collection of high quality, carefully formatted, accessible, open source, and free public domain ebooks that meet or exceed the quality of commercially produced ebooks." EPUB and ebook files compatible for multiple ebook devices.
800+ free ebooks - Open Culture
Download 800 free and openly licensed/freely available eBooks to your Kindle, iPad/iPhone, computer, smart phone or ereader. Collection includes great works of fiction, non-fiction and poetry.
Online Books Page - Univ. of Pennsylvania Libraries
A website that facilitates access to books that are freely readable over the Internet. Many are in the public domain. Searchable listings, or browse by author, titles, or subject.

Movies:

Library of Congress National Screening Room
This online collection spans more than 100 years of cinema history, from 1890-1999. Most, but not all, of the featured films are in the public domain, and available to download as well as watch.
1000+ Free Movies Online - Open Culture
Links to over 1000 free movies online, many of which are in the public domain. Includes classic, indies, noir, westerns, etc. Organized by genre and title.

Please note that open access materials are NOT necessarily openly licensed. In general, you can link to open access materials, but you must check each site's terms of use for any further copyright or usage restrictions (e.g. restrictions on downloading or making copies of materials).

Open access (OA) refers to online research outputs that are free of all restrictions on access (e.g. access tolls or subscriptions). Open access can be applied to all forms of published research output, including peer-reviewed and non peer-reviewed.

Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ)
Quality-controlled scientific and scholarly open-access journals, covering a wide range of subjects and many languages. The aim of the DOAJ is to increase the visibility and ease of use of open access scientific and scholarly journals.
OMICS Group
International through its Open Access Initiative is committed to make genuine and reliable contributions to the scientific community. OMICS Group hosts over 300 leading-edge peer reviewed Open Access Journals and organizes over 100 International Conferences annually all over the world.
SpringerOpen
SpringerOpen journal portfolio includes peer-reviewed, fully open access journals across all areas of science. It ranges from very specialized titles to SpringerPlus, an interdisciplinary open access journal that covers all disciplines.
Science Direct Open Access Journals
Almost 600 open access titles are available in this leading scientific database. The TCC Library also has a subscription to this database, which provides access to more scientific journal titles that are not openly accessible.
Elsevier Open Access Journals
All articles in open access journals which are published by Elsevier have undergone peer review and upon acceptance are immediately and permanently free for everyone to read and download. Elsevier Open Access Journals also available in ScienceDirect.

OER multimedia

Each site linked below may contain content which may vary in open licenses or usage permissions.

Inclusive image sites:

American Education: Images of Teachers and Students in Action
Photo repository of real, diverse preK–12 students and teachers in different education and tech categories. Licensed CC-BY-NC (Creative Commons - Attribution - NonCommercial).
If/Then Collection
"A digital asset library of women STEM innovators, for educational and other noncommercial use." Scroll down page for categories of images and videos, including Women in Tech, #SheCanSTEM, Health & Medicine, and more.
Gender Spectrum Collection: Stock Photos Beyond the Binary
Stock photo library featuring trans and non-binary models. Licensed under a CC BY-NC-ND (Creative Commons - Attribution - NonCommercial - NoDerivatives) license.
PICNOI
Stock photo library of diverse multi-racial images. Licensed CC-BY (Creative Commons - Attribution).
Black Illustrations
Illustrations of Black people, organized in themed packs, e.g. Activism, Business, Education, STEM, and more. Browse image packs available for free. Site's licensing allows you to reuse, revise, and/or remix images.
Nappy
Photo library of Black and Brown people. Explore collections and categories. Licensed CC0 (Public Domain).
#WOCinTech Chat photos
Extensive stock photo collection of WOC (women of color) in tech. Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license.
Disability Inclusive Stock Photography
Stock photographs featuring people with disabilities in tech or business settings. Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives (CC BY ND) License.
Disabled And Here Collection
Photo collection featuring disabled Black, Indigenous, people of color (BIPOC) across the PNW. LGBTQ+, Lifestyle, Social, and Work categories. Licensed CC-BY (Creative Commons - Attribution).
AllGo Plus-Size Stock Photos
Stock photos featuring plus-size people. No modification or commercial use allowed. See front page for sample attribution statement.
Images of Empowerment
Photo library of women's activities, particularly work and health-related, from around the world. Explore by location or subject. Licensed CC-BY-NC (Creative Commons - Attribution - NonCommercial).
Open Peeps
Library of hand-drawn, mix-and-match illustrations of people of different genders, ethnicities, and abilities. Licensed CC0 (Public Domain).
Redefining Women Icon Collection
Collection of icon illustrations of women in different active scenarios and careers. CC0 (Creative Commons Zero - Public domain) license.

Public domain image sites:

Pixabay
All images and videos on Pixabay are released under a Creative Commons Zero (CC0) public domain license. Searchable by keyword or by type (video, illustration, photo, etc.).
PxHere
All images on this repository site are licensed under the CC0 public domain license.
Pexels
Free stock photos and videos in a variety of categories and formats. Modification allowed, and attribution not required; site license equivalent to CC0 Public Domain.
Stock Snap
Photos and images on this site have a Creative Commons Zero (CC0) public domain license. Searchable by keyword or by categories.
Unsplash
Unsplash photos are licensed under the Creative Commons Zero (CC0) public domain license. Searchable by keyword or by collections.

Image sites with a mix of openly licensed and public domain images:

Flickr
Flickr hosts millions of Creative Commons-licensed images. Notably, Flickr provides a separate Creative Commons licensed videos collection. Search tip: After searching with a keyword, click the "Any license" filter to narrow down to images with different kinds of open licenses.
Wikimedia
Wikimedia Commons is a media file repository that is completely dedicated to providing educational media that are released either in the public domain or under Creative Commons license. Search tip: To check the license information on any image, scroll down the page to the Licensing section.
Creative Commons Search
Search for free images in the public domain and under Creative Commons licenses.
Morguefile
Morguefile is a free photo archive. The site was created to serve as a free image exchange for creative professionals and teachers to use in their work. Search Tip: Search by keyword and then click on the license link for more specific info on how to use that image.

Each site linked below may contain content which may vary in open licenses or usage permissions.

TED Talks
TED Videos have a CC BY NC ND 4.0 license, and TED encourages users to freely view, share, and download the videos without restraint. The website is provided as a public service to promote the spread of good ideas.
TED-Ed
TED-Ed is TED’s youth and education initiative. TED-Ed Originals are short, award-winning animated videos about ideas that spark the curiosity of learners everywhere.
Netflix Educational Documentaries
Playlist of current educational documentaries available to stream for free from Netflix via YouTube. Current titles include: 13th, Our Planet series, Amend: The Fight for America series, We the People series, Abstract: The Art of Design series, and more. Open access. Guidelines and terms of use linked on this playlist.
Khan Academy
Khan Academy provides top-quality educational videos that are organized by discipline and skill levels. They provide videos from various disciplines including Math, Science, Economics, Finance, and Humanities.
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Technically, Khan Academy is no longer an OER repository. The videos are no longer openly licensed, but all Khan Academy videos are still free for anyone to watch, but adaptation is not allowed.
YouTube
YouTube provides millions of Creative Commons-licensed videos (among their billions of video collections). The key is filtering them to isolate the Creative Commons-licensed ones.
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Search tip: Once you search using keywords, use the filter to narrow down to the CC licensed videos.
Vimeo
Like YouTube, Vimeo hosts millions of Creative Commons-licensed videos. In addition, Vimeo provides a separate Creative Commons licensed video collection which makes the filtering process much easier.
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See the Open WA page on Vimeo, http://www.openwa.org/vimeo/, for detailed directions and screenshots for different ways to filter down to CC-licensed videos in Vimeo.
Creative Commons Search
Search for free images in the public domain and under Creative Commons licenses.
If/Then Collection
"A digital asset library of women STEM innovators, for educational and other noncommercial use." Scroll down page for categories of images and videos, including Women in Tech, #SheCanSTEM, Health & Medicine, and more.
Open Video Project
A shared digital video collection, managed by School of Information and Library Science, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Includes video collections from NASA, National Arcives, Internet Moving Images Archive, and more. Search by keyword or browse videos by genre, duration, color, and sound. Most videos are from government agencies and under public domain.
Library of Congress National Screening Room
This online collection spans more than 100 years of cinema history, from 1890-1999. Most, but not all, of the featured films are in the public domain, and available to download as well as watch.
1000+ Free Movies Online - Open Culture
Links to over 1000 free movies online, many of which are in the public domain. Includes classic, indies, noir, westerns, etc. Organized by genre and title.
List of open-source films on Wikipedia
Open-source films (also known as open-content films and free-content films) are films which are produced and distributed by using free and open-source and open content methodologies. Their sources are freely available.

Each site linked below may contain content which may vary in open licenses or usage permissions.

Free Music Archive
"Free Music Archive and Tribe of Noise are known for free to download music licensed under Creative Commons."
Public Domain and Royalty Free Music - PD Info
Massive lists of public domain music and songs, as well as royalty free music. From the Public Domain Information Project site.
Creative Commons Search
Search for free images in the public domain and under Creative Commons licenses.
Library of Congress Audio Recordings Search
Listen to music, interviews, field recordings, and more from the Library's historic sound recording collections.
900+ Free audio books - Open Culture
Download hundreds of free and openly licensed audio books, mostly classics, to your MP3 player or computer. Includes fiction, poetry, and non-fiction.
CCMixter
This is a community music remixing site featuring remixes and samples licensed under Creative Commons licenses.
SoundBible.com
Offers free sound clips for download in either wav or mp3 format. Each sound clip has license information, so look for that column when determining license and usage.
Wikimedia Commons: Free media resources/Sound
List of free/open source sound websites
Citizen DJ
"The concept of Citizen DJ is grounded in hip hop culture." Includes free-to-use audio and video collections from the Library of Congress. Scroll down the home page to view music collections. All sounds are free-to-use for remixing.

Library Research Guides

Open Education Guide: Find OER

What's on this page?

I want to know... how to find OER in my field.

OER meta-search engines -- save time by searching multiple OER repositories!

OER repositories, reviews, courses, textbooks, and journals

General or multi-institution:

State-specific:

Institution-specific:

General or multi-institution:

State-specific:

Institution-specific:

K-12 / Adult Education:

Humanities/Writing/Research:

Languages:

Prof/Tech:

Science:

Technology:

Books:

Movies:

OER multimedia

Inclusive image sites:

Public domain image sites:

Image sites with a mix of openly licensed and public domain images:

Attributions