MIT and The Community College: Part 2

?? I promised part two when I initially penned the article on MIT and community colleges, so here it is. I had way too much that I wanted to cover in one article and wow, it felt like I spent much of part 1 just defining the terms, so here I’ll focus more on the big picture with OER content and why the work of institutions like MIT is so important.

?? The community college is an amazing place. There are students looking to learn a trade. There are students looking to get cheap credit hours as they prepare to go to a four-year university, and there’s a wealth of non-traditional students all looking to make their way in the world. Obviously, a one-size-fits-all method cannot work for a diverse cast of characters such as the community college student population.

?? This is where OER comes in. The hyper-adaptable nature of OER content is a recipe for success at the community college level. Find a really good nursing textbook and you just need to change some state specific stuff? There’s an OER for that! Seriously though, OER can be edited and adjusted internally and as needed to better fit the nuances of a given course or curriculum. The adaptability though, is just a small piece of the puzzle. Because they don’t have to be built from the ground up each time, the inefficiency of the standard textbook development model is made unnecessary. This saves money. OER is free anyway, but by significantly reducing labor costs of new textbook creation, faculty and institutions can free themselves from considerable financial burdens.

?? From the students’ perspective the operating efficiency of their college may not be exactly in the forefront of the matter, but it helps them, nonetheless. Reduced overhead at institutions means fewer expenses passed to the student through fees. Simple enough of a concept, but it’s making students aware of this tends to be the trick to it.

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Estimates place savings at $117 per student for every course they take which utilizes OER content…

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?? In addition to the reduced costs for the school, there’s the obvious effect of the student not having to pay for their course materials using OER. The most reasonable estimates put savings at $117 per student for every course they take which utilizes OER content instead of traditional materials (Allen, 2019).

?? However, the real saving is seeing students make it to graduation day because their dreams weren’t snuffed out by high fees. The domino effect here is startling. High prices on higher education keep students from graduating, saddling them with debt and preventing them from entering the workforce, ultimately harming the economy overall. OER has a powerful effect then to this end in ensuring that students can don the cap and gown. Simply put, students can more readily focus on their coursework when they’re not in fear of eviction for lack of rent payment and their stomachs aren’t growling because they had to choose between a textbook or a meal.

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It's about leveling the playing field…

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?? Perhaps though, one of the most powerful things that OER accomplishes is ensuring that every student has access to an education that fits their needs. Beyond just being cheap or free, OER content affords everyone, regardless of background, to have a more fair and equitable education. Its adaptability makes it suitable for a highly diverse audience and it’s equitable since it ensures that no one must go without an education over the price of a textbook. It’s about leveling the playing field. OER is a force for economic and sociocultural equity (Hulbert et al., 2025).

?? I want to preface what I am about to say with this; I am in no way paid by MIT. I just want to take a moment to reinforce the idea that their work is so crucial. OpenCourseWare is such a blessing for community colleges across the nation. Institutions such as Maricopa Community Colleges and College of the Canyons are already reaping the rewards. Their robust size and considerable investments are saving students in the millions. For example, Maricopa Community Colleges are saving students as much as 40 million dollars as reported by MIT (Segal, 2024).

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Community college students cannot afford to roll the dice with their education…

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?? The community college mission, as stated before, is to provide an adaptable education that fits the needs of a wide range of students who can’t necessarily afford to go broke paying for it (Segal, 2024). That’s why OER is so important to those institutions as it is a perfect fit for those two things. That’s why the work of MIT and other institutions is so important. We are giving students a chance to thrive by using OER content. Community college students cannot afford to roll the dice with their education, and OER helps to prevent that.

?? Who’s funding this though? Most of the funding for OER content creation appears to be coming from the state level (Hulbert et al., 2025). Of course, who could blame them? States unsurprisingly have an invested interest in seeing their students succeed in college because typically higher graduation rates correlate with higher quality of life.

?? Next, let’s talk about who’s making the OER content. It’s not just MIT. Rice University with their well-known “OpenStax” content is another great example. Additionally, academic libraries are leading the charge in content creation and are even creating OER dedicated roles when funding allows (Hulbert et al., 2025). This did not come as a surprise to me honestly, I have met staff from libraries in larger institutions who actually had the title “OER Librarian”. The idea of having dedicated librarians for OER content creation and curation is simply a phenomenal step in the right direction in my opinion. As an avid fan of academic libraries, and a MLIS student, I love to see that our campus libraries are the birthplace of the future of higher education; a lifeline in a world where the cost of college and university has run rampant.

?? In summary, community colleges cater to a student population that needs adaptable and flexible course materials. OER is designed to check both boxes for our students. Lastly, institutions such as the ones we’ve discussed thus far are all doing their part to bring students this education. Four-year research institutions are actively reaching out a helping hand to community colleges with their own missions. That is one of the best olive branches I’ve ever seen in higher education.

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References

Allen, N. (2019, March 8). A new method for estimating OER Savings. SPARC. https://sparcopen.org/news/2018/estimating-oer-student-savings/

Hulbert, I., Harkins, D., & McBride, M. (2025). Charting the Course: Case Studies in OER Sustainability. ITHAKA S+R. https://www.jstor.org/stable/resrep66734

Segal, S. (2024, June 26). Collaborating to support Community College faculty in teaching with MIT Open Educational Resources. MIT Open Learning. https://openlearning.mit.edu/news/collaborating-support-community-college-faculty-teaching-mit-open-educational-resources