Five years ago at the 2013 Open Education Conference, we issued a challenge to the OER community to save students $1 billion by 2018.
Over the past three months, SPARC and our member libraries have worked to document OER adoptions over time. More than 100 organizations and individuals contributed to this effort, resulting in information on OER use at more than 4000 institutions, primarily in the U.S. and Canada but also all around the world.
Today we are thrilled to share that the data show that the OER movement has saved students, parents, schools and governments at least $1 billion dollars. While we continue to process the data and numbers will eventually be higher, we have documented at least the following savings:
- U.S. & Canada Higher Ed: $921,783,169
- U.S. & Canada K-12: $45,051,066
- International: $38,500,000
- Total: $1,005,334,235
SPARC announced this important milestone live this morning at the 15th annual Open Education Conference in Niagara Falls, NY. Further details will be presented during a session this afternoon, and full documentation including calculations and data tables will be published on our project page in the coming weeks.
Now that we have hit $1 billion in savings, it’s time to think bigger for our next challenge. While cost savings are a powerful metric, the benefits of OER extend far beyond financial impact to include pedagogy, innovation, and social impact.
Click here to submit your ideas for the next big OER challenge!
