University System of Maryland Receives Federal Grant to Examine the Role of Academic Libraries and Consortia in Increasing the Relevance of Open Educational Materials

Effort to be led by USM William E. Kirwan Center for Academic Innovation and the USM and Affiliated Institutions Library Consortium

Baltimore, MD (July 31, 2023) – The University System of Maryland (USM) has received a two-year planning grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS), a federal agency charged with advancing, supporting, and empowering America’s museums, libraries, and related organizations through grantmaking, research, and policy development.

The USM grant, which will be led by the USM William E. Kirwan Center for Academic Innovation and University System of Maryland and Affiliated Institutions Library Consortium (USMAI), will articulate the role of academic libraries and library consortia in increasing the relevance of open educational resources (OER) through OER localization, defined as the practices and partnerships necessary to increase the relevance of OER for differing student populations, student learning needs, faculty interests, and institutional and community contexts.

The USM grant of $149,877 comes under the IMLS National Leadership Grants for Libraries program, which supports projects of national impact that address significant challenges and opportunities facing the library and archives fields and have the potential to advance theory and practice with new tools, research findings, models, services, practices, or alliances that will be widely used.

“Our goal is to develop a framework that can be used across academic library and consortial contexts to position these entities as leaders in and supporters of OER localization,” said Nancy O’Neill, Acting Director of the Kirwan Center and co-PI for the grant. “This work fits squarely within the NLG program mission, and we are delighted that we will have the opportunity to engage with library colleagues nationally and across Maryland in the process.”  

Out of 118 NLG program proposals submitted this year, only 33 projects were funded, among them the USM planning grant.

In addition to advancing the field of OER from a narrow focus on cost savings toward a broader commitment to equity and student success, the USM project also intends to spur national dialogue about the roles that academic libraries and consortia can play in contributing to student success through the development and sustained support of relevant, constituency-oriented instructional materials and practices.

“Libraries and their consortia are playing very active roles in the proliferation and success of Open Educational Resources,” said Andrew K. Pace, Executive Director of the USMAI Library Consortium and co-PI for the grant. “We’re excited to help frame the importance of localizing these efforts and to clarify the important role for libraries and consortia within the larger open education and open scholarship ecosystem.”

This grant project is the latest initiative to come under the umbrella of the Maryland Open Source Textbook Initiative (M.O.S.T.)., which supports long-term, statewide scaling and sustainability of open educational resources (OER) to increase access, affordability, and achievement for Maryland higher education students across community colleges and private and public four-year institutions. The USM Kirwan Center leads M.O.S.T. in partnership with the Maryland Association of Community Colleges, the Maryland Independent College and University Association, MarylandOnline, and most recently, USMAI. Since 2014, M.O.S.T. has enabled faculty teaching 197 courses at 28 institutions across Maryland to switch to OER, resulting in more than $20.6 million in cumulative textbook cost savings for students.

Additional information about the USM William E. Kirwan Center for Academic Innovation can be found here.

Additional information about University System of Maryland and Affiliated Institutions Library Consortium can be found here.

Additional information on the Maryland Open Source Textbook Initiative can be found here.

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The Institute of Museum and Library Services is the primary source of federal support for the nation’s libraries and museums. We advance, support, and empower America’s museums, libraries, and related organizations through grantmaking, research, and policy development. IMLS envisions a nation where individuals and communities have access to museums and libraries to learn from and be inspired by the trusted information, ideas, and stories they contain about our diverse natural and cultural heritage. To learn more, visit www.imls.gov and follow us on Facebook and Twitter.


The USM comprises 12 institutions: Bowie State University; Coppin State University; Frostburg State University; Salisbury University; Towson University; the University of Baltimore; the University of Maryland, Baltimore; the University of Maryland, Baltimore County; the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science; the University of Maryland, College Park; the University of Maryland Eastern Shore; and the University of Maryland Global Campus. The USM also includes three regional centers—the Universities at Shady Grove, the University System of Maryland at Hagerstown, and the University System of Maryland at Southern Maryland—at which USM universities offer upper-division undergraduate and graduate courses. USM institutions and programs are among the nation’s best in quality and value according to several national rankings. To learn more about the University System of Maryland, visit www.usmd.edu. To learn about the new USM Strategic Plan, “Vision 2030: From Excellence to Preeminence,” visit https://www.usmd.edu/vision2030/


 

Contact: Mike Lurie
Phone: 301.445.2719
Email: mlurie@usmd.edu