Your AL$/OER Librarian
Search to Replace a Specific Textbook
- CSU Search for Free Course Materials by ISBNEnter the ISBN of a textbook or other course materials you would like to replace to search for a free alternative! This search box searches California's MERLOT repository.
Open Textbooks and Course Materials
A curated list of top places to look for free and open educational resources:
- Open Textbook LibraryA good one-stop place to search for open textbooks from multiple publishers, including OpenStax and Saylor Foundation.
- Pressbooks DirectoryPressbooks Directory provides an index of books published across Pressbooks networks, many under the auspices of colleges or universities. You can search all the metadata of books in this high-quality collection. You can also filter books by keyword, subject matter, license, and more.
- OpenStaxHigh-quality, peer-reviewed, open textbooks on introductory topics. Students can buy print copies. OpenStax has quiz banks, slides, and other ancillaries freely available for instructors who sign up with them. OpenStax Allies offer competitively-priced homework platforms that work with OpenStax books.
- COOL4EdThe California Open Online Library for Education (COOL4Ed) connects you to searchable materials, showcases and information on affordable learning. A joint project of the CSUs, UCs and CCCs.
- Open Oregon Educational ResourcesA list of resources already being used in higher education in Oregon, many with instructor contact information.
- GALILEO Open Learning MaterialsA project of GALILEO and the University System of Georgia. Includes high-quality open textbooks and ancillary materials.
- LibreTextsA platform allowing faculty to find open textbooks, recombine existing open materials, and create their own. Supports LaTeX for math and science.
- Lumen LearningOffers a wide array of open content that you can access for free. Their Waymaker and OHM modules are low-cost homework platforms that can be integrated with Brightspace.
- Mason OER Metafinder (MOM)MOM searches a wide range of open resources in one place. Especially useful if you’re looking for more specific or advanced materials.
- Affordable Learning Solutions' OER pageThe CSU AL$ OER page lists top places to find high-quality OER and low-cost course materials.
Discipline-Specific OER Collections
- American Institute of Mathematics Approved Open TextbooksOpen textbooks and additional materials which been judged to meet the evaluation criteria set by the AIM editorial board.
- Stanford Business Case StudiesPerform your search, then choose "Narrow your results" and select "Available to download at no charge."
- MIT Sloan School of Management Case Studies and Management SimulationsAlthough not OER, everything in this library has a Creative Commons license and can be downloaded, copied, and distributed or used free of charge, without asking permission.
Finding Affordable Materials through the Cal Maritime Library
Electronic resources available through the library are free to use for the campus community and can qualify as free or low-cost course materials, even if they are under copyright. Ask your liaison librarian if you'd like a deeper search.
- OneSearchSearch Cal Maritime's print and digital collections in one place.
Open Access Textbooks and Journals
- OpenStaxHigh-quality, peer-reviewed, open textbooks on introductory topics. Students can buy print copies. OpenStax has quiz banks, slides, and other ancillaries freely available for instructors who sign up with them. OpenStax Allies offer competitively-priced homework platforms that work with OpenStax books.
- Open Textbook LibraryA good one-stop place to search for open textbooks from multiple publishers, including OpenStax and Saylor Foundation.
- LibreTextsA platform allowing faculty to find open textbooks, recombine existing open materials, and create their own. Supports LaTeX for math and science.
- COOL4EdThe California Open Online Library for Education (COOL4Ed) connects you to searchable materials, showcases and information on affordable learning. A joint project of the CSUs, UCs and CCCs.
- Directory of Open Access BooksOpen-Access books from major academic publishers such as Routledge, Taylor & Francis, Springer Nature and university presses. Books can be located through the Library's OneSearch search interface or on the website.
- Open UNC / UNC Press Open MonographsMonographs include recent works in topics including Nearly 100 additional titles are available open access from the UNC Press. Areas of strength include Appalachian and North Carolina Studies, education, and literature. Increasingly, OSPS is partnering on open access textbooks, including sociology and political science texts and a six-volume textbook used in courses covering microwave and radio frequency design, as well as the UNC Studies in Germanic Languages and Literatures series.
- JOLT: Journal of Online Teaching and LearningThe MERLOT Journal of Online Learning and Teaching (JOLT) is a peer-reviewed, open access, online publication addressing the scholarly use of multimedia resources in online education. JOLT is published quarterly in March, June, September, and December.