IHE Accessibility in OER Implementation Guide
Overview
In this section, you and your team will engage in a Landscape Analysis to uncover key structures and supports that can guide your work to support Accessibility in OER. You may or may not answer all of these questions, but this is an offering.
Section One: Landscape Analysis for Accessibility in OER in Local Context
In this section, you and your team will engage in a Landscape Analysis to uncover key structures and supports that can guide your work to support Accessibility in OER. We encourage to explore some of the questions from each category. You may or may not answer all of these questions, but this is an offering. We ask that you complete Parts One, Two and Six of this Section.
Part One: Initial Thoughts
What is your team's initial goal for this series?
Our initial goal for this series was simply to develop our individual understandings and capacities in regards to OER and accessiblity and to formulate a strategy for improving the utilization of accessible OER at CLTCC.
Part Two: Introductory probing questions:
What does accessibility look like in our organization? How do we measure accessibility?
Accommodations for students are managed through the dean of academic affairs. Accessibility as a whole is addressed by the colleges Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Accessibility committee, of which the library director is the chairman.
What does OER look like in our organization? How do we measure access to OER?
While we are utilizing a great deal of OER (particularly in our fully-online general education courses), our implementation of OER has been somewhat haphazard without the technical support or strategic planning necessary to make it completely successful for either faculty or students.
Part Three: Clarifying questions for accessibility:
What are the organizational structures that supports accessibility?
Who generates most of the accessibility structures/conversation in our organization?
Where do most educators get support with accessibility?
What content areas might have the largest gaps in access to accessibility?
Part Four: Clarifying questions for OER:
What is our organizational structure that supports curricular resources?
What is our organizational structure that supports OER?
Who generates most of the curricular resources in our organization?
Where do most educators get support with curricular resources?
What content areas might have the largest gaps in access to curricular resources/OER?
Part Five: Clarifying questions for Faculty learning and engagement:
What Professional Learning (PL) structures have the best participation rates for our educators?
What PL structures have the best "production" rates for our educators?
What incentive do we have to offer people for participating in learning and engagement?
Who are the educators that would be most creative with accessibility and OER?
Who are the educators that would benefit the most from accessibility and OER?
Part Six: Final Probing questions:
What is our current goal for Accessibility in OER and why is that our goal?
Our current goal for Accessibility in OER is to establish clear standards for both accessibility and OER implmentation at CLTCC and to achieve those standards through the development of clear procedures and faculty development in these areas. This is our goal because up until recently OER and accessibility have been handled somewhat haphazardly at CLTCC.
Who have we not yet included while thinking about this work?
Faculty senate's role in promoting OER and accessiblity has not been explored. There are initial efforts to form a OER Interest Group at CLTCC and these efforts are being promoted through faculty senate.
What barriers remain when considering this work?
The OER climate or culture at CLTCC is somewhat chaotic. There is no dedicated instructional design department for the college, so teaching faculty are left to their own interests and abilities when identifying, developing or adapting OER for their courses. The accessibility and accommodation landscape at CLTCC is similarly unsettled at the present time.
What would genuine change look like for our organization for this work?
The outcomes of genuine change in our organization would be a formal procedure for the adoption, adaptation, and utilization of OER in all of our course offerings, accessibility standards for all OER that is used in our courses and training on how to meet those standards, and an ongoing process of quality review of our online courses and their utilization of OER with accessiblity at its heart.
Section Two: Team Focus
Identifying and Describing a Problem of Practice
The following questions should help your team ensure that you are focusing your collaboration.
What is your Team’s specific goal for this series? You may consider using AEM Quality Indicators for Creating Accessible Materials to help add to or narrow your work. Our specific goal for this series was to develop a set of best practices for Accessibility in OER at Central Louisiana Technical Community College.
What other partners might support this work? There are several departments within CLTCC that might be interested in supporting this work, including disability support services, student services, and e-learning.
What is your desired timeframe for this work? Our goal is to form a task force for OER by the start of the Fall 2024 semester, and for that task force to create and disseminate a handbook for faculty interested in adopting, adapting, and creating accessible OER by the end of the Spring 2025 semester.
How will you include diverse voices and experiences in this work? In cooperation with an ongoing effort in open pedagogy with the Forest Technology department, we are seeking input on OER best practices from students of diverse backgrounds, industry partners, and community stakeholders. We are also planning to present on our OER initiatives at our system authority's annual conference and also at the state academic library consortium's annual conference.