Cost

In a time when the need for an educated society and government resources for education are scarce, money can potentially be saved by sharing and re-use of educational resources. Creating videos and other digital artifacts, curriculum components, and case studies cost much in the way of time, equipment, knowledge, and training. Does it not make sense to share? Unless there are vast improvements or advancements in a discipline, rather than repeating the creation of a lesson on geography, anatomy, dental hygiene, or art history, it is more effective to use what has already been created. Likewise, if a content expert spends a year creating a valuable resource, time is saved by sharing with others so it can be expanded on rather than repeating what has already been produced.

Open Education Resources are often funded by philanthropic organizations (Foundations) and universities.

Neither governments, educational institutions nor students can easily afford their education, so the adoption of options with cost saving benefits must top the list of priorities.  In this video, David Wiley, Co-Founder and Chief Academic Officer of Lumen Learning, discusses some of the financial considerations of Open Educational Resources.

However, cost is only one of the values of Open Educational Resources.

Collaboration

Creating and producing open educational resources allows researchers and developers to collaborate and build on knowledge. The Open philosophy is more inclusive than exclusive, seeking to break barriers and not build them.

Access

Knowledge as a public good

This US Department of Education award winning video summarizes the potential benefits shared education can have with those who need it the most.

In 2012, The Commonwealth of Learning, an intergovernmental organization created by Commonwealth Heads of Government created a report addressing the business case for Open Educational Resources.  This report specifically addresses both course design and open publishing as well as the effect of open education and accreditation. The report concludes despite the ever-present and on-going need for funding in education, regardless of which model is selected, there are four areas in which there could be an economic gain from the support of OERs:

The full report is available here: Exploring the Business Case for OER