9 How Do I Know My OER Is Ready?

From Finished Draft to Ready-to-Use OER

Completing the instructional content is an important milestone, but it does not necessarily mean your OER is ready to publish.

Before sharing it, complete the front and back matter that helps readers understand and use the resource. Then review the OER as a whole and invite others to review it too. Colleagues, students, and other reviewers can help you identify gaps, questions, and opportunities for improvement that are difficult to see after working so closely with the resource yourself.

Complete Your Front and Back Matter

Front and back matter provide important information about your OER that may not belong in the instructional chapters themselves. What you include will depend on the resource you created, but there are several elements you should consider before publication.

Complete Your Front Matter

Your front matter introduces the resource and provides information readers may need before they begin using it. Depending on your OER, consider including:

• Title and author or contributor information so readers can clearly identify the resource and its creators;
• Copyright and open license information explaining how others may use the resource;
• Adaptation and attribution information when your OER builds upon one or more existing resources;
• An accessibility statement describing the accessibility practices used in developing the resource and how readers can report accessibility barriers;
• An AI use statement when generative AI played a meaningful role in developing the resource;
• Acknowledgments recognizing collaborators, reviewers, contributors, funding, or other support;
• A preface or introduction explaining the purpose, audience, organization, or intended use of the resource; and
• A table of contents that accurately reflects the structure of the finished resource.

Complete Your Back Matter

Back matter provides information or resources that support the book but do not need to appear within the instructional chapters. Depending on your OER, this might include:

• references or a bibliography;
• a glossary;
• appendices;
• supplemental resources;
• information about authors or contributors; or
• other supporting material appropriate to your resource.

Not every OER needs every type of front or back matter. Include what helps readers understand, use, evaluate, and appropriately reuse your resource.

Make Sure It Represents the Finished OER

If you adapted an existing OER, some front or back matter may have come with the original resource. Review all of it rather than assuming it still belongs.

Before moving into review, make sure:

• the title and author or contributor information is accurate;
• copyright and open license information reflects the finished resource;
• adaptation information is included when appropriate;
• your accessibility and AI use statements accurately describe your work;
• acknowledgments reflect the people and organizations that contributed;
• the preface or introduction accurately describes the finished resource;
• references, glossaries, appendices, and other supporting material are complete; and
• information inherited from a source OER has been removed or updated when it no longer applies.

Start With Your Own Review

Before asking someone else to review your OER, experience the complete resource yourself.

Try not to edit every sentence as you go. First, look at the resource as a whole and pay attention to how the pieces work together. Then conduct more focused reviews of alignment, accuracy, accessibility, licensing, and attribution.

Review the OER as a Complete Resource

Read through the resource with fresh eyes and ask:

• Does the organization make sense from beginning to end?
• Does each chapter have a clear purpose?
• Are there gaps where students may need more explanation or support?
• Is anything unnecessarily repeated?
• Does terminology remain consistent throughout the resource?
• Do examples and explanations make sense in the context of this course?
• Do transitions between topics help students understand how ideas connect?
• Are there remnants from an original OER or another institution that no longer belong?
• Does the finished resource feel like one intentionally designed book rather than pieces assembled from different sources?

If you adapted or remixed multiple OER, this final question is especially important. Your students should experience one coherent learning resource, even if its content originated in many different places.

Compare the OER With Your COR and Course Plan

Early in this process, you began with your course rather than a textbook. Now return to that starting point.

Compare the finished OER with your Course Outline of Record (COR). If you created a course map, use it as an additional reference. Make sure the resource you created still supports what students actually need to learn and do.

Ask:

• Does the OER address the content students need for the course?
• Are important topics missing or underdeveloped?
• Does the sequence support the way students will learn the material?
• Is the depth appropriate for the course?
• Does each major section serve a clear learning purpose?
• Is there content that could be removed because students do not actually need it?

Check Accuracy and Currency

You are the disciplinary expert. Before publication, review the content with that responsibility in mind.

Pay particular attention to:

• facts and explanations;
• discipline-specific terminology;
• data and statistics;
• research and references;
• examples and case studies;
• laws, standards, policies, or practices that may change over time;
• links to external resources; and
• content that was substantially revised or newly created during the development process.

This review is especially important when you have combined content from several OER or used AI during drafting, editing, or production. AI can be helpful throughout the development process, but anything included in your OER remains your responsibility to review and verify.

Verify Licensing and Attribution

If you kept attribution information with your content as you developed the OER, this should be a verification step rather than a reconstruction project.

Before publication, check that:

• adapted and remixed OER content has appropriate attribution;
• you can still trace material back to its original source when needed;
• licenses permit the ways you have used and adapted the content;
• licenses are compatible when you have remixed openly licensed materials;
• images, media, and other third-party materials have appropriate permissions and attribution; and
• your attribution records are complete enough to maintain as the OER changes over time.

If you discover something you are unsure about, return to How Do I Know If I Can Use and Change an OER? before publishing.

Confirm Your Accessibility Review Is Complete

Accessibility should have been considered throughout development rather than saved for the end. At this stage, confirm that the accessibility review has been completed and that changes made during later development did not introduce new barriers.

Check that:

• the accessibility practices described in your accessibility statement are reflected in the finished resource;
• available accessibility checking tools have been used;
• images, tables, links, headings, lists, and other content structures have been reviewed;
• linked and embedded resources have been considered; and
• the formats you plan to provide to students have been reviewed.

If you identify concerns that still need attention, return to How Do I Make My OER Accessible? or work with ATRC for accessibility support.

Invite Others to Review Your OER

Your own review is essential, but it should not be the only perspective your OER receives before publication.

After spending so much time developing a resource, you know what you intended to communicate. That can make it difficult to recognize what another reader will actually experience. Other reviewers can identify things you may no longer notice and bring expertise and perspectives different from your own.

You do not need every reviewer to evaluate the entire book. Different people can review different aspects of the resource.

Ask a Discipline Colleague to Review the Content

A colleague who understands the discipline can provide an important second perspective on the academic content.

You might ask them to consider:

• Is the content accurate and current?
• Are important concepts missing?
• Is the terminology appropriate and consistent?
• Is the depth appropriate for the course?
• Are explanations clear enough for someone learning the material for the first time?
• Are the examples accurate, relevant, and useful?
• Is anything included that seems unnecessary?

You might invite a Palomar colleague who teaches the same or a related course, a colleague in your discipline at another college, a faculty member who may eventually adopt the resource, or someone you have connected with through an OER community.

Ask Someone to Review the Learning Experience

A reviewer does not have to be a disciplinary expert to provide useful feedback. Someone with experience in teaching, course design, or instructional design can focus on how students are likely to experience the resource.

They might consider:

• Does the organization support the learning sequence?
• Are explanations and directions clear?
• Are headings and other structural elements meaningful and consistent?
• Is the amount of information manageable?
• Are students given enough support for difficult concepts?
• Does the resource connect clearly with what students are being asked to learn and do?

An Instructional Designer can help review alignment, organization, learning design, and the overall student experience.

Ask Students to Review the Resource

Students bring a perspective that faculty and other experts cannot fully reproduce. They are the people who will actually have to find information, follow explanations, interpret examples, and learn from the resource.

You do not need to ask students to formally review an entire textbook. Current or former students might review selected chapters or provide feedback on questions such as:

• Where did you get confused?
• What explanations or examples were particularly helpful?
• Was there terminology you did not understand?
• Was anything difficult to find?
• Were there places you had to reread several times before they made sense?
• Was there anything you expected to find but could not?
• What would make this resource easier to use or learn from?

Student feedback does not replace disciplinary or accessibility review. It gives you something different: insight into how the resource works for the people it is intended to support.

Give Reviewers Something Specific to Look For

Instead of simply sending someone the book and asking, “What do you think?” tell them what kind of feedback would be most useful.

You might ask someone to review the entire resource, but you can also ask them to focus on a particular chapter, topic, feature, or concern. A focused request is often easier for the reviewer and more useful to you.

Decide What to Do With Reviewer Feedback

Reviewers will not always agree with one another, and you do not need to make every suggested change.

As you consider feedback, ask:

• Does this identify an accuracy problem?
• Would this make the content clearer for students?
• Does this reveal a gap or unnecessary content?
• Would this improve alignment with the course?
• Does this identify an accessibility or usability concern?
• Is the suggestion based primarily on a different teaching preference rather than a problem with the resource?
• Would making the change improve the learning experience?

Also look for patterns. One comment may reflect an individual’s preference. If several reviewers independently identify the same issue, that is worth examining closely.

Feedback gives you another perspective. You decide what belongs in the final resource.

Complete Your Final Pre-Publication Review

After you have completed your own review, gathered feedback from others, and made the changes you believe are appropriate, complete one final check of the entire OER.

Where Would You Like to Go Next?