The Open and Affordable Textbooks (OAT) Program is an incentive program designed to make higher education more affordable for Rutgers students. Through OAT, the Libraries award research funds to Rutgers faculty who redesign their courses to use free or low-cost materials or who create a new open textbook. Our goal is to support course material affordability at Rutgers, promote the use of open and affordable educational resources, and empower faculty to innovate their teaching through the use of open, free, or library-licensed materials and teaching aids.
The OAT Program offers two awards:
- The OAT Course Redesign Award ($2,500) incentivizes the use of open educational resources (OER), library collections, or other free or low-cost course materials.
- The OAT Authoring Award ($3,500) supports the creation and development of a new open textbook for use at Rutgers and beyond.
To date, the OAT program has saved Rutgers students over $13 million.
The OAT Program awards research funds to full- and part-time faculty and curriculum developers who:
- Adopt: Replace a traditional textbook with a free, low-cost, or open alternative
- Innovate: Replace a traditional textbook with articles, book excerpts, audio, or video that are licensed through Rutgers University Libraries, open access, or freely available online
- Create: Replace a traditional, high-cost textbook with one that they will design, author, and provide for free or at low cost to students
- Enrich: Augment a course that currently uses open and affordable materials through the addition of significant supplementary learning and/or instruction materials.
Partners
We are thankful for the collaboration and support of the students and organizers in NJPIRG. Read about their textbook affordability efforts.
Please contact the office of the Vice President for University Libraries and University Librarian (848-932-7505) if you are interested in learning more about OAT Program sponsorship opportunities.
Contacts
Rutgers Health
Matthew Bridgeman, Information and Education Librarian, Robert Wood Johnson Library of the Health Sciences
Rutgers University–Camden
Zara Wilkinson, Reference/Instruction Librarian, Paul Robeson Library
Rutgers University–New Brunswick
Lily Todorinova, Undergraduate Education Librarian, Open Educational Research, Douglass Library
Julia Maxwell, Social Sciences Librarian, Alexander Library
Rutgers University–Newark
Naomi Gold, Reference and Instruction Librarian, Dana Library
Collections & Digital Strategies
Rhonda Marker, Head, Open Knowledge Strategies, Rutgers University Libraries