OER & Textbook Affordability

Every term faculty must report their course materials to the Duck Store. Reporting is required by Oregon law, and it lets students know how much their books and materials will cost, plan for those expenses, and find copies of all their materials before the start of the term. Reporting to the Duck Store also gives the Duck Store time to stock books and materials, and UO Libraries time to purchase ebook copies of required books where possible.

Timeline and Reporting

The Provost's office maintains an excellent guide on course material reporting which includes updated timelines each term and a link to the Duck Store's guide to using the course material reporting tool. In general, all course materials should be reported 6 weeks before registration opens to students.

Any book, ebook, courseware, or other material that is required or optional for students in your course should be reported to the Duck store. This includes free books and materials like Canvas Readings, Library readings, and OER. 

Why Report Free Materials?

Reporting free materials lets students their readings before classes starts. When you report your materials as free students can see that your course is no-cost on the course schedule and the Duck Store website. Reporting also helps the textbook affordability team at the library track our progress and advocate for funding for textbook affordability grants and programs.

The Duck Store's reporting instructions go into more detail about the entire reporting process with a focus on reporting paid materials like print books, ebooks, and courseware. This guide will focus only on reporting free materials (OER, Library Readings, Canvas Readings). Unlink other free materials, library readings can be reported as free materials or as paid materials with a free library option. See the library readings section below for more information.

1. Login to Verba Collect
2. The first question asks if you need to add materials. Always select "Yes, I need to add books, OER materials, or supplies" if you use any materials in your course. Materials include paid books/ebooks, courseware, free Canvas Readings (PDFs, links to online articles), Library Readings, OER, and other free readings and materials. The only time you would select "No, I do not need to add books, OER materials, or supplies" is if you do not use any materials (free or paid) in your course. 
   
3. Choose the 'Add Manually' tab to add free materials.
   
4. Choose "Add FREE (OER/Library/Canvas)" to add free materials.
   1. Description / Title: For OER or Library Readings: add the title. For Canvas Readings: write "Canvas"
   2. Supplier / Creator: Add the publisher and/or author
   3. Add a link to the material if available (for OER and Library readings)
      
       
5. Once you click 'add' you'll be asked for some additional information.
   1. If there's an ISSN/ISBN you can add it here. Some of the questions may not make sense for free materials.
6. Repeat for each individual book/material, once you've added all your required materials, review and submit.
7. Optional: When you review and submit, add a note to students to tell them more about the materials for your course.
   

There are two options for reporting materials that are available from the library. You can use the 'Report Free' option above if the library owns an unlimited ebook version of your required book and you only want students to access their book from the library. But we recommend that most faculty report their books as traditional paid materials using the Duck Store's "add new materials" or "Add Manually" > "Add Book."

When you report your book as a paid material, the Duck Store will stock print copies of your book for students to purchase. This lets students who prefer print access a print option. To let students know that there is a free option, use the "add a note" section when you Review and Submit your materials, to tell students that the book is available digitally from UO libraries.

For more information about using library ebooks as course materials, and how to request new ebook purchases for courses, please visit the library ebooks for courses page.