Zero Cost Course Resources Initiative Guide (Open Educational Resources (OER) / BU Library eResources)

Free and open access through the Internet to written and spoken words, sound recordings, still and moving images, prints, maps, and sheet music that document the American experience.
Most of the American Memory collections have been migrated to new presentations.
The full list of all digitized collections at the Library of Congress can be found at The Library of Congress Digital Collections (https://www.loc.gov/collections/).

A multimedia anthology selected from various Library of Congress holdings. This collection illustrates the vibrant and diverse forms of popular entertainment, especially vaudeville, that thrived from 1870-1920. Included are 334 English- and Yiddish-language playscripts, 146 theater playbills and programs, 61 motion pictures, 10 sound recordings and 143 photographs and 29 memorabilia items documenting the life and career of Harry Houdini. Groups of theater posters and additional sound recordings will be added to this anthology in the future.

A massively collaborative open U.S. history textbook

Some collections are freely available; however, most can only be accessed on site.

Online library of thousands of books by authors such as Dickens, Austen, Shakespeare and many others

The DPLA offers a single point of access to millions of items—photographs, manuscripts, books, sounds, moving images, and more—from libraries, archives, and museums around the United States. Users can browse and search the DPLA’s collections by timeline, map, format, and topic.

A nonprofit digital textbook with chapters covering 1492-2019, presenting an unvarnished look at American history and analyzing interpretive controversies. It includes free lectures, maps, videos, podcasts, newspaper archives, timelines, Census stats, and sites where top thinkers write and argue about the past.

Digitized collections of primary source materials relating to the history and culture of the United States. The site offers more millions of digital items from several hundred of the Library of Congress' historical collections.

Collections of images and information about topics such as: Point of Pines Slave Cabin, Emancipation Proclamation, Richard Allen's Money Box, Harriet Tubman's Shawl, and Royal African Company Stock Certificate. Provides access to the Slavery & Freedom Exhibition, and collections of stories and other resources.

Provides educators and students with new perspectives on Native American history, cultures, and contemporary lives.

Contains freely accessible academic books published in European networks, mainly in the area of humanities and social sciences. Works with publishers to build a quality controlled collection of open access books, and provides services for publishers, libraries and research funders in the areas of deposit, quality assurance, dissemination, and digital preservation.

Free cultural and educational media. Includes online courses, audio books, movies, podcasts, eBooks, etc.

An initiative from Alexander Street to build the world’s largest free index of digital resources for the study of music. Curated by a community of music scholars, students, teachers and librarians, the Open Music Library brings together peer-reviewed journal articles, books, and music scores from the world’s digital collections.

It's free, award-winning digital content unlocks the expertise of hundreds of leading scholars, making the history of art accessible and engaging to more people, in more places, than any other publisher.

Although these eBooks are not Open Educational Resources, they are Open Access and available for use without a fee. These eBooks are in the humanities and social sciences.

Publishes articles and books of interest to both the writing-across-the-curriculum community and the larger writing studies community, provides a wide range of web-based resources for instructors who wish to use writing in their courses, and supports research in the use of writing to support learning and teaching.

The online home for visual arts from all around the world. Their primary goal is to make world’s art accessible to anyone and anywhere. WikiArt already features some 250.000 artworks by 3.000 artists, localized on 8 languages. These artworks are in museums, universities, town halls, and other civic buildings of more than 100 countries. Most of this art is not on public view. With your active involvement, we are planning to cover the entire art history of the Earth, from cave artworks to modern private collections. We also provide you with tools for translation on as many languages as needed.

Significant primary materials from countries and cultures around the world

This Project is a non-profit animation studio that produces short-form, fully animated videos to make the biblical story accessible to everyone, everywhere. The mission of this Project is to show how the Bible is a unified story that leads to Jesus. While not official OER, these videos could be used in Bible courses, or could provide faith integration content for other courses.

Provides courses on the Bible and theology from top biblical professors. The courses are in five primary programs: Foundations (starting point), Academy (college and university level classes), Institute (graduate level), Leadership, Seminars, and other programs.

A virtual library for theology, religious studies, and related disciplines

This anthology of OER contains almost 100 textbooks on a variety of different aspects of business, management, and leadership. Topics include sustainable business practices, employabilty skills, workplace safety, international business guides, etc.

From the McCombs School of Business, University of Texas at Austin. These videos and case studies present the latest research and top experts with creative zing to make learning ethics easy, memorable, and fun. This free educational program is used around the world by more than 1,200 colleges and universities, in hundreds of businesses and organizations, and by tens of thousands of ethics learners.

Open Educational Resources in the fields of business, economics, mathematics, and statistics. Combines free open textbooks with affordable high quality online homework, comprehensive editorial services, and in-house support.

Combines a digital atlas with extensive descriptive text. It is organized as a multi-hierarchy outline that reinforces broader histological concepts and parallels the content of most histology textbooks. Features on-demand labeling of structures and interactive quizzes with formative feedback.

Includes an updated and expanded set of health IT instructional materials, funded by the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC). The instructional materials are in five areas relevant to improved care delivery: population health, care coordination and interoperable health IT systems, value-based care, healthcare data analytics and patient-centered care.

World's largest science, technology, and medicine open access book publisher

An integrated program that includes classroom lectures (mostly PowerPoint presentations), student and instructor references, assignments and assessment items. Everything is online (MS-Word, Excel and PowerPoint) and can be downloaded for true Open Access. The courses are based on international standard content, adapted for low-resource settings and specially designed to bridge common gaps in foundational skills and problem-solving.

Will have five OER nursing textbooks with 25 associated virtual reality scenarios. The first text was released Fall 2020, and the last text will be released Fall 2022.

Provides access to over 700 texts in life science and healthcare

Provides reliable information about pregnancy and parenting. Has a library of more than 5,000 pieces of content, created and refined over the past 20+ years, has been written by more than 100 healthcare professionals and industry experts including experienced pediatricians and parenting coaches, and is then vetted by board-certified physicians.

Provides information about nutrition and fitness. Has a library of more than 6,000 pieces of content, created and refined over the past 20+ years, has been written by more than 100 healthcare professionals and industry experts including experienced dietitians, nutritionists, and personal trainers, and then vetted by board-certified physicians.

Provides reliable, understandable, and up-to-date health information. Has a library of more than 18,000 pieces of content has been written by more than 100 healthcare professionals and industry experts including experienced doctors, nurses, and patient advocates, and is vetted by our panel of board-certified physicians.

Provides trusted information about mental health. Has a library of more than 4,000 pieces of content, created and refined over the past 20+ years, has been written by more than 100 healthcare professionals and industry experts including experienced doctors, therapists, and social workers, and then vetted by board-certified physicians.

A repository of freely downloadable mathematical works hosted by the American Mathematical Society as a service to researchers, faculty and students. It includes:
* Draft works including course notes, textbooks, and research expositions. These have not been published elsewhere and are subject to revision.
* Items previously published in the Journal of Inquiry-Based Learning in Mathematics, a refereed journal
* Refereed publications at the AMS

Funded by the National Science Foundation as part of the National Science Digital Library. Is being created by a team of project partners led by Internet Scout.

Extensive list of biology animations and videos covering a wide range of topics from the BBC, McGraw Hill, Carnegie Mellon, and more

Offers a series of 12 interactive, inquiry-based biology simulations and exercises designed for college and AP high school biology students. This website is owned by the California State University. It was developed with partial support from the National Science Foundation.

Provides access to General Chemistry and Organic Chemistry study guides, exercises, and practice tests

Learning simulations covering Automation & Robotics, Electrical & Motor Control, Process Control or Renewable Energy

Shared content in subject areas such as: Language Arts, Math, Science, Social Studies, World Language, and Fine Arts

Real science, real stories, and real data to engage students in exploring the living world

World's largest science, technology, and medicine open access book publisher

Over 300 simulations, interactives, and case studies on a wide variety of science topics

An online resource portal for biology education in ecology, plant biology and evolution. Resources include photos, figures, charts, datasets and lesson plans for educators on biological concepts.

Open Educational Resources in the fields of business, economics, mathematics, and statistics. Combines free open textbooks with affordable high quality online homework, comprehensive editorial services, and in-house support.

Runs on the open source, IMathAS platform, providing free hosted use of this platform in support of free, open textbooks like the ones listed on OpenTextBookStore.com. Provides free online homework for several open math textbooks.

Provides activities, information, and curriculum for educators and students.

Provides access to thousands of reports from the National Academies Press and the Transportation Research Board, and to journals/periodicals such as "Proceedings of the National Academies of Sciences" and "Issues in Science and Technology".
Also links to Information Booklets which are designed to improve understanding of today's most important and complex scientific, engineering, and medical issues. For example: Energy, climate change, stem cells, metagenomics, transportation, drinking water, ocean science, and plant sciences.

Serves science, technology, engineering, and mathematics education

A "crowd sourced" list of simulations/virtual labs, case studies, data sets, media, etc.

Source for ready-to-adopt open textbooks--the best quality textbooks issued under open licenses that allow for printing. Primarily mathematics texts.

Provides fun, free, interactive, research-based science and mathematics simulations.

Provides access to over 700 texts in life science and healthcare

A free, online educational resource provided for educational purposes. VBL simulates natural environments with the way life responds to changing conditions. It provides a world to be explored rather than a path to be followed. Background information and technical instruction help students learn by experimentation. Parameters and conditions adjust easily for observable effects and consequences. Because these are stochastic simulations, no two runs are identical. The data generated are biologically realistic and are displayed numerically and graphically. Typically, students will design experiments and conduct them using their models, but collect and analyze their data in other software.

Lists free science resources designed to support remote science education. This directory is updated as new resources are identified. Note that, while all resources in this directory are free, not all are open.

Current and innovative virtual labs technologies, lab experiments, and simulations used in teaching the science, technology, engineering, and math disciplines in higher education

XBio offers two main types of content (Narratives and Key Experiments) and complementary resources (a Bio-Dictionary and Activities). Narratives cover major topics in biology, similar to a textbook chapter with a storytelling approach. Key Experiments tell the story of an influential experiment, usually written by the scientist(s) involved. It leads the reader through the techniques and data associated with the experiment, as well as its subsequent impact.

A free multilingual literacy resource for children and youth worldwide. Includes a wide variety of illustrated stories from the African Storybook and other open sites. Development continues at the University of British Columbia, Canada.

Although these resources are not traditional Open Educational Resources, they are available via Ebooks Minnesota.
This collection includes educational and professional development books for teachers, educators, and students from kindergarten through high school. From developing reading and writing skills to teaching English language learners to text structure and assessment, this collection contains resources and strategies relating to ELA.

Provides educators and students with new perspectives on Native American history, cultures, and contemporary lives.

Psychology textbooks. Compiled from Noba modules to fit the scope and sequence of common courses. Can be used as-is or customized to fit one's needs. Instructor manual, PowerPoint presentations, and test bank available for many modules.

Contains freely accessible academic books published in European networks, mainly in the area of humanities and social sciences. Works with publishers to build a quality controlled collection of open access books, and provides services for publishers, libraries and research funders in the areas of deposit, quality assurance, dissemination, and digital preservation.

Designed to help students understand the science of psychology. Provides highly interactive resources for the teaching of psychological science.

A collaborative project that addresses open education, open access, open science, and the practices that support them.

A multidisciplinary, project-based curriculum that supports students in conducting original research, asking original questions, and communicating methods and results using the language of statistics. This website presents learning materials to support this innovative project-based approach and to directly and creatively tackle many of the most significant challenges currently faced by instructors and students.

The Teaching Commons brings together high-quality open educational resources from leading colleges and universities. Curated by librarians and their institutions, the Teaching Commons includes open access textbooks, course materials, lesson plans, multimedia, and more.

Although these eBooks are not Open Educational Resources, they are Open Access and available for use without a fee. These eBooks are in the humanities and social sciences.

Contains more than 700 original print-quality photos of real preK–12 students and teachers. These royalty-free photos are available for use under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 license (CC BY-NC 4.0).

About 30,000 images of artwork from the Cleveland Museum of Art's world-renowned collection of art available for commercial and non-commercial purposes. Also provides access to portions of collections information (metadata) for more than 61,000 artworks, both in the public domain and those works with copyright or other restrictions.

Creative Commons (CC) is an initiative to make available content and knowledge that creators wish to share freely and legally. CC's search tool searches the Web for content to which creators have attached a CC license, making it available for re-use. Be sure to pay attention to what sort of rights the creators have attached to their works as the licenses vary.

Many Flickr users have chosen to offer their work under a Creative Commons license, and you can browse or search through content under each type of license.

The Advanced Image Search allows you to limit your search for Google Images by Usage Rights (e.g., free to use or share; free to use or share, even commercially; free to use, share, or modify; free to use, share or modify, even commercially)

More than 375,000 images of art works available under Creative Commons Zero through an Open Access policy.

Free themed collections of high-quality photos

Provides access to millions of the Smithsonian’s 2D and 3D digital items—with many more to come. This includes images and data from across the Smithsonian’s 19 museums, nine research centers, libraries, archives, and the National Zoo.

Beautiful, free photos gifted by the world's most generous community of photographers

A media file repository making available public domain and freely-licensed educational media content (images, sound and video clips) to everyone, in their own language. It acts as a common repository for the various projects of the Wikimedia Foundation, but you do not need to belong to one of those projects to use media hosted here. The repository is created and maintained not by paid archivists, but by volunteers.

Provides overview videos in a variety of subject areas, such as: history of science, statistics, engineering, theater and drama, media literacy, sociology, computer science, world history, biology, ecology, literature, U.S. history, chemistry, psychology, anatomy & physiology, astronomy, U.S. government & politics, economics, philosophy, physics, world mythology, and film: history, production, and criticism.

Provides access to Royalty Free and Public Domain music. It has two licensing choices:
1.) Creative Commons Music: Free copyright music. You will need to add a credit to the end of your video (generated when you choose a song).
2.) Standard License: Requires a $25 fee and is appropriate to use when you want licensing but may not want to add attribution or credits to your project.

Provides access to over 7,000 videos in 13 subjects areas in math, natural science, social science, and humanities.
Because they include educational levels from middle school to college, you will need to verify that the level is appropriate for your students.

Offers practice exercises, instructional videos, and a personalized learning dashboard that empower learners to study at their own pace in and outside of the classroom. They cover math, science, computer programming, history, art history, economics, and more. You must set up a free account to access.

Audio recordings of books in the public domain

Historical recordings from the Library of Congress

Podcasts on a variety of topics

Free cultural and educational media. Includes online courses, audio books, movies, podcasts, eBooks, etc.

An initiative from Alexander Street to build the world’s largest free index of digital resources for the study of music. Curated by a community of music scholars, students, teachers and librarians, the Open Music Library brings together peer-reviewed journal articles, books, and music scores from the world’s digital collections.

Provides streaming access to many PBS videos. However, some are only available with a TPT membership.

Video clips on business, leadership, and entrepreneurship

A clearinghouse of free knowledge from the world's most inspired thinkers. TED is a nonprofit devoted to spreading ideas, usually in the form of short, powerful talks (18 minutes or less). TED Videos are not officially licensed with any kind of open licensing. However, TED allows the users to freely view and download the videos without restraint.

Similar to 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.

A media file repository making available public domain and freely-licensed educational media content (images, sound and video clips) to everyone, in their own language. It acts as a common repository for the various projects of the Wikimedia Foundation, but you do not need to belong to one of those projects to use media hosted here. The repository is created and maintained not by paid archivists, but by volunteers.

You will need to verify that a video is Open Access or has a Creative Commons license

A non-profit consortium of mostly US law schools that conducts applied research and development in the area of computer-mediated legal education. Provides eBooks, lessons, and online interactive tutorials in legal subjects. Nearly every US law school is a member of CALI.

OER ancillary materials for higher education. High-quality materials curated from OpenStax textbooks.