This post was contributed by Heather White, Mt Hood Community College, and adapted from Marking Open and Affordable Courses: Best Practices and Case Studies, licensed under CC-BY.
Heather White, Library Technical Services & OER Coordinator at Mt Hood Community College, recently published a case study on MHCC’s implementation of the No Cost and Low Cost course labels required by HB 2871.
The open access book Marking Open and Affordable Courses: Best Practices and Case Studies helps higher education institutions across the country implement course marking for open and affordable educational resources by summarizing relevant state legislation, providing tips for working with stakeholders, and analyzing technological and process considerations. The book is divided into two main sections. The first section provides high-level analysis of the technology, legislation, and cultural change needed to operationalize course markings. The second section presents case studies for those interested in how others have implemented course markings.
Heather’s case study on Mt Hood Community College outlines how MHCC came into compliance with HB 2871 by Fall 2017, how their work evolved over the first two years of implementation, and how they navigated the complexities of implementing new policies and procedures in a large organization with multiple stakeholders. To facilitate reporting and publishing of course markings, MHCC created a home-grown web form that instructors fill out to automatically mark their course sections as either No Cost or Low Cost in the online course registration schedule. This case study covers the full scope of project management from technical configurations to cultural leadership, change management to marketing. The case study concludes with recommendations for anyone else embarking on a similar project.
