OER Academic Development & Continuous Improvement Grant

The Open Educational Resources Grant Program is a competitive grant program administered by the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board for Texas public institutions of higher education. Established in 2018, the program supports institutional efforts to adopt, modify, redesign, or develop courses that use only open educational resources. The program authority is identified in the General Appropriations Act, House Bill 1, Article III, Section 44, 88th Legislative Session, Regular Session, with implementing regulations in Texas Administrative Code Title 19, Part 1, Sections 4.230 through 4.238. The purpose of the program is to encourage faculty at Texas public institutions of higher education to use open educational resources in courses. An open educational resource is defined as a teaching, learning, or research resource that is in the public domain or released under an intellectual property license that permits free use, adaptation, and redistribution by any person. The program is tied to the policy direction established by Senate Bill 810, which added Section 61.0668 to the Texas Education Code to encourage faculty to adopt, modify, redesign, or develop courses using only open educational resources. For the 2025-2027 grant cycle, eligible applicants are Texas public institutions of higher education, with faculty leading the work. Private institutions are not eligible. Collaborative applications are allowed, but one Texas public institution must be identified as the applicant. For Development Grants, applications that propose cross-institutional collaboration receive priority points, and the application should include a plan for including faculty from at least one other Texas public institution as contributors or peer reviewers. The program includes two expected award categories. Development Grants provide up to $25,000 to Texas institutions of higher education to develop new open educational resources or substantially improve existing open educational resources for one or more courses. Development Grants require one-to-one matching contributions from the institution or institutions; these contributions may be in-kind but may not include faculty salaries. Implementation Grants, also described as Continuous Improvement Grants, provide up to $5,000 to support substantial redesign of one or more courses to incorporate existing open educational resources. Grant-funded resources must be made freely available in electronic format to students and faculty across Texas and must be posted in the OERTX repository. Resources that are free only to students at the applicant institution, such as content from subscription library databases, do not satisfy the open availability requirement. If a grant recipient wishes to pay another person or entity using grant funds, that arrangement is treated as subcontracting and must be specified in the application and approved in writing by THECB if a grant is awarded. For the 2025-2027 grant cycle, applications were due by 11:59 p.m. Central Time on December 2, 2024, and questions about the RFA were due by 11:59 p.m. Central Time on November 22, 2024. No formal letter of intent was required. Applications were required to be submitted to OERGP@highered.texas.gov. Award announcements were expected in June 2025, and the grant period begins upon execution of the Notice of Grant Award and ends on August 31, 2027. The number of grants awarded depends on available appropriation and the evaluation of applications by qualified reviewers. Future opportunities may be announced through THECB updates, OERTX Digital Learning News and Events, or future legislative and program actions.

Emphasize statewide open access, OERTX repository posting, open licensing compliance, and cross-institutional collaboration for Development Grants. Avoid relying on institution-only subscription resources because resources must be freely available electronically to students and faculty across Texas.