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Open educational resources and copyright: what do you need to consider?

By Rafael, on 7 November 2024

This is the last article of our Copyright and Open Science series by Christine Daoutis, UCL Copyright Support Officer, which explored important aspects of copyright and its implications for open research and scholarship.

An Open Educational Resources logo featuring an open book with pages transforming into upward-pointing hands, set against a blue background.

Image caption. Jonathasmello, CC BY 3.0 , via Wikimedia Commons

In this post, we conclude our Copyright and Open Science series by focusing on open education. Broadly defined, open education is “a philosophy about how people should produce, share, and build on knowledge” (source: What is open education? Opensource.com). It refers to values, practices and resources that aim to make scholarship more accessible, equitable, sustainable, transparent and collaborative.

The UNESCO definition of OERs highlights the importance of freely accessible educational materials in advancing open education practices globally. This includes the creation and reuse of OERs—materials that are either out of copyright or licensed to allow reuse. However, open education extends beyond resources to include practices such as integrating open science into teaching, sharing educational practices, and co-creating resources with learners.

OERs include a wide range of materials, such as open textbooks, open access articles, lecture handouts, images, film, slides, lecture recordings, assessment resources, software and whole courses such as Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCS). By default, all these resources are protected by copyright. If you’re planning to create open educational resources, here’s some copyright advice.

Addressing copyright in OERs

1. Know who owns what. If you are creating or collaborating on a teaching resource, it is essential to clarify who holds the copyright. This could be you, the author; your employer, if the work was created in the course of employment; or the resource could be co-owned with others, including students or sponsors. To license a resource for reuse (for example, to make it available under a Creative Commons licence), you must own the copyright to the resource and/or agree such licensing with co-owners. ♦ Copyright ownership at UCL is addressed in the UCL IP Policy.

2. Make the resources openly available and reusable. Once you are certain that the resource is yours to license, consider making it openly available, under a licence that allows reuse. Open access repositories support the discovery and access of different types of materials, including OERs. UCL has a dedicated OER repository, which accepts materials created by its staff and students.

As for licensing: we have explained in a previous post how Creative Commons licences work; and you can read more on how CC licences support OERs on the Creative Commons wiki. Licensing under the most permissive of the licences, the Creative Commons Attribution licence (CC BY), supports the ‘five Rs’ of OERs: enabling others to “retain, revise, remix, reuse and redistribute the materials”. (David Wiley, Defining the “Open” in Open Content and Open Educational Resources, Improving Learning blog).

A cartoon of a smiling stick figure pushing a shopping trolley filled with objects labeled 'CC' (Creative Commons) and holding up a yellow 'CC'-labeled item. The figure is placing an object on a bookshelf with colorful books and 'creative' works.

Image caption: sOER Frank, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons

3. Address any third-party materials. If the resource contains materials you don’t own the copyright to (such as third-party content), you have a few options:

  • Reuse works that are out of copyright (public domain) or openly licensed. These might include Creative Commons images and videos, open access articles, and OERs created by others. ♦ See UCL’s guidance on finding OERs and a reading list with links to many openly licensed resources.
  • Get permission from the copyright owner. If the material is not openly licensed, you might consider seeking permission to reuse it. Be clear about how the resource containing the material will be shared (i.e., as an OER). Third-party materials included in an OER should be shared under their own copyright terms (e.g., their reuse may be more restricted than the rest of the resource) and this should be communicated when sharing.
  • Rely on a copyright exception. In some cases, instead of getting permission you may decide to rely on a copyright exception, notably the quotation exception in UK copyright law. Using exceptions requires judgement. You’ll need to determine whether the use of the material is ‘fair dealing’: does the purpose justify the use? Does it affect the copyright owner’s market? Overall, is it “fair” to all parties involved? Be aware that copyright exceptions vary by country, which is important when making a resource globally available. The Code of Best Practices in Fair Use for Open Educational Resources explores these approaches further, putting forward a framework that could be applied internationally.

Putting the copyright advice to practice: examples from UCL’s copyright online tutorials.

The screenshot shows the UCL Copyright Essentials 2023-2024 module page. On the right side, there's an image of stormtroopers marching in formation. The content discusses the use and adaptation of images under Creative Commons licenses. Below the stormtroopers, there are links to additional copyright resources. The layout is clean and educational, providing information on legal considerations for using and modifying copyrighted materials with appropriate licensing. On the left side, the course menu outlines the entire module and includes links to further reading.

Screenshot from UCL’s Copyright Essentials tutorial, which includes a photo by Michael Neel from Knoxville, TN, USA, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

While creating UCL’s Copyright Essentials and Copyright and your Teaching, two online tutorials introducing copyright, the UCL Copyright support team drew on its own advice. Specifically:

  • Copyright ownership and attribution were addressed. Copyright Essentials is an adaptation of an original resource, which was also openly licensed. Attribution to all original authors was included.
  • Both tutorials are publicly available online, allowing anyone to access and complete them. They are also licensed for reuse under the Creative Commons Attribution licence, permitting others to adapt and redistribute the materials with appropriate attribution.
  • Third-party materials mostly included openly licensed images and links to lawfully shared videos and documents. However, for some materials, we opted to rely on copyright exceptions, which involved a degree of interpretation and risk. This was highlighted in the tutorials, inviting learners to reflect on the use of exceptions.

It should be noted that using proprietary e-learning tools (like Articulate Rise) to develop the tutorials restricts reuse. While the shared resources can be accessed, they cannot be downloaded or edited. Authors wishing to adapt the resources have the option to recreate the materials under the licence terms or contact us for an editable copy. Ideally, these resources should be created with open-source tools, but there’s a trade-off between the advantages of user-friendly, accessible proprietary tools and these limitations.

For more advice on copyright and OERs please contact copyright@ucl.ac.uk.


Read more from the Copyright and Open Science Series:

OA Textbooks: UCL Press Perspective

By Rafael, on 23 October 2024

As we continue celebrating International Open Access Week, it’s inspiring to see how open access is shaping research and collaboration across UCL! Earlier this week, we explored the balance between collaboration and commercialisation, and highlighted the important work of Citizen Science initiatives.

Midway through the week, Dhara Snowden, Textbook Programme Manager at UCL Press, shares her insights below on the growing significance of open access textbooks and their role in the broader landscape of open access publishing.

Logo for International Open Access Week featuring a stylized orange open lock, symbolizing open access. The text "International Open Access Week" is displayed in gray, black, and orange, with modern typography.


UCL Press is the UK’s first, and largest, fully open access university press. We have been publishing books and journals for almost ten years, covering a wide range of subjects and formats. In 2021, the press launched a new programme focusing on open access (OA) textbooks. I joined at that time, and over the past three years, I’ve been responsible for managing our progress in this area. As part of this year’s International Open Access Week, I wanted to share some of our thinking and planning around this activity and offer some musings about OA textbook publishing in general and what the future holds.

What are Open Access Textbooks?

Firstly, it’s useful to clarify what we mean by “textbooks.” Through conversations with academics across faculties, I’ve realised this term can mean different things depending on the context and level of study. In the broadest sense, a textbook is a resource that supports the delivery of a course or module. Textbooks can provide a wide-view survey of a field or subject, to be “adopted” as the main guide for study, or they can be part of a reading list that includes chapters from various sources, like journal articles.

Although textbooks were traditionally published in print, there has been increasing demand for digital versions of commercial textbooks, which can be purchased by individuals and licenced to institutions for use for multiple users.

Open access publishing, meanwhile, involves making scholarly content freely available online, removing subscription or purchase barriers. In the context of textbooks, this means students and educators can access high-quality educational resources without significant costs. OA textbooks are typically published under a Creative Commons (CC) licence, which allows for redistribution, adaptation, and modification, promoting a collaborative and inclusive educational environment.

The creation and uptake of OA textbooks has seen a sharp increase in recent years, particularly in the US and UK, with non-profit-funded publishers like OpenStax, collaboratively funded projects like CORE Econ, and platforms like Pressbooks. The Open Textbook Library, supported by Open Education Network, currently indexes 1,542 published open textbooks.

Why do we create them?

The UCL Press textbook programme was set up in direct response to issues around pricing for institutional access to essential e-textbooks, which were exacerbated during the Covid-19 pandemic. The current ecosystem presents an unstable and unsustainable financial model for institutional libraries, as well documented by the eBooks SOS campaign, which calls attention to the lack of regulation in pricing by commercial publishers.

An article published by Insights in 2022,Perspectives on e-books and digital textbooks and the way ahead’, claims that ‘combined spending on book across nationally negotiated library purchasing frameworks increased from £55M in 2019/20 to £73M in 202/21, with e-textbook provision increasing by 281% to £25.1M during that time’.

In addition to concerns about affordability and sustained access, the Insights article outlines that post-pandemic, “shifts in teaching practice are accelerating demand for features that enhance blended learning”, with more flexibility and adaptability in resources being required, which isn’t being delivered by traditional academic publishing.

UCL Press’s aims to disrupt the current academic publishing ecosystem, offering authors and readers an alternative to the commercial model. This connects the theme for OA Week 2024, which calls for community over commercialisation. Bringing publishing back to the hands of academy, we can provide sustainable and high-quality textbooks to facilitate hybrid teaching and remove barriers to access for our content thereby reaching the widest possible audience and increasing chances to impact in scholarly communities.

How do we create them?

The UCL Press textbook programme commissions and publishes textbooks for undergraduate and postgraduate students across a wide range of subjects and topics. Every new proposal (and final manuscript) undergoes a rigorous peer-review process to ensure high-quality and relevant content.

Our approach is to collaborate with lecturers to create resources that provide high-quality guidance for students. Taking a personal and flexible approach to each project, we avoid rigid templates or a one-size-fits-all mentality, tailoring our textbooks to the needs of students and subject matter.

The cover of the textbook An Introduction to Waste Management and Circular Economy by Stijn van Ewijk and Julia Stegemann features a collage of industrial waste, recycling materials, and abstract patterns symbolizing the circular economy. The background transitions from deep blue to green, reflecting environmental themes. The title appears in bold white font at the top, with the authors' names below in smaller text. A UCL Press logo is centered at the bottom, giving the cover a modern, academic look.The cover of Methods and Methodologies in Heritage Studies, edited by Rachel King and Trinidad Rico, features a sequence of black-and-white images of a horse and rider in motion, evoking a sense of movement and time in line with heritage studies. The UCL Press logo is centered at the bottom.

To date, we’ve published two textbooks. The first, An Introduction to Waste Management and Circular Economy, came out in December 2023. This textbook supports a module taught at UCL but also has global relevance for courses in environmental engineering, resource efficiency, bioenergy, and waste-to-energy technologies.

More recently, we published  Methods and Methodologies in Heritage Studies, an edited collection exploring the disciplinary debates, intellectual legacies, and practical innovations that shape contemporary understandings of heritage value.

 

A bar graph from UCL Press shows monthly textbook access statistics, illustrating a steady increase in engagement from December 2023 to September 2024. A world map accompanies the graph, highlighting global reach, with countries shaded to indicate varying access levels. The U.S., in dark green, shows the highest access, while other countries are represented in lighter shades, denoting different degrees of interaction worldwide.

 

Together, these two titles have been downloaded over 12,000 times in 152 countries and territories. Our forthcoming titles include, A Guide to Performing Systematic Reviews of Health and Disease and Fundamentals of Dark Matter, both due to publish early next year.

What are the benefits of writing or using OA textbooks? Where’s the value?

There are many benefits to writing and using OA textbooks and the European Network of Open Education Librarians have created a toolkit to encourage use of OA materials and Open Educational Resources (OER). Some key points are listed below.

  • Reaching a Global Audience: downloads and views from readers across the globe, particularly the Global South.
  • Cost-Effectiveness: One of the most significant advantages of OA textbooks is their cost-saving potential for both library and student. OA resources can alleviate this burden, allow to redistribution of saved funds and make education more accessible for all.
  • Adaptability: open licences enable reuse, modification and adaptation, enabling educators to make the content work best for teaching.
  • Showcase Teaching Excellence: OA textbooks can help platform new approaches or area of study, and celebrate examples of teaching excellence.
  • Encourage lifelong learning: Provide students with resources they can use and reference after their studies and into their careers.
  • Accessibility and Inclusivity: Open access textbooks are available to anyone with an internet connection, supporting diverse learners, including those in remote or under-resourced areas, and those outside academic institutions(e. professionals and policy makers)
  • Up-to-Date Content: Traditional textbooks can quickly become outdated. OA textbooks can be updated and revised more readily, ensuring that students have access to the most current information.
  • Enhanced Collaboration: Open resources encourage collaboration among educators, fostering a community of shared knowledge and innovation.

To measure impact, we use both qualitative and quantitative measures. Our Statistics dashboard shows the readership and reach of our books, including a map of access. In addition, we are collecting testimonials and feedback from academics and students and engaging with the societal impact of our books (as discussed in a recent article in The Scholarly Kitchen). We interrogate our user analytics to understand which communities are interacting with our content and how they are using it in their own work.

Value in this context is calculated not only in terms of cost-saving on commercial provision, but also in the added value student experience. This includes showcasing teaching excellence to encourage enrolment in a particular course or providing a teaching and learning resources for a module that are underrepresented in commercial provision (i.e. those with smaller cohorts/interdisciplinary topics/less mainstream perspectives).

What does the future hold?

The future of open access textbook publishing in the UK looks promising, with increasing institutional support and growing awareness among educators. As the demand for affordable and accessible educational resources continues to rise, the potential for OA textbooks to reshape higher education is significant.

Open access textbook publishing represents a vital shift in the academic landscape, providing a sustainable, equitable, and collaborative approach to education. As more institutions and publishers embrace this model, we hope to create a future where quality educational resources are accessible to all, empowering students and educators alike.

Significant sea change in the status quo requires a long-term outlook, and significant investment and commitment. If educators, students, and policymakers continue to discover and advocate for the adoption of open access resources within institutions, there is potential to foster an educational environment that fully supports and values accessibility, collaboration, and innovation.

UCL Press will continue to develop its programme of OA textbooks and to keep up to date with our publications, please do sign up to our mailing list or take a look at our website.

Community over Commercialisation?

By Kirsty, on 21 October 2024

Today marks the start of International Open Access Week 2024! Throughout the week, we’ll be sharing insights from UCL staff on how open access is shaping research, collaboration, and scholarship across the university. To kick off the series, Kirsty Wallis explores the significance of this year’s theme and the challenges and opportunities of balancing openness with commercialisation in ways that benefit both research and society.


Promotional image from the International Open Access Week committee. A person holds an orange door hanger with a circular cut-out, partially covering their face. The sign reads, "Ask me about Open Access. International Open Access Week," with the Open Access logo at the bottom.The theme for this year’s International Open Access Week (OA Week), “Community over Commercialisation,” intends to provide a starting point for us to reflect on the importance of community in the work that we do relating to Openness, rather than letting financial or commercial interests take focus.

This is the second year focusing on this theme, which shows its significance in Open Science and Scholarship and the growing interest in these discussions.

The UNESCO Recommendations on Open Science highlight the issues of groups profiting from publicly funded research and advocate for non-commercial, collaborative publishing models.

This year’s OA Week invites reflection on critical questions around commercialisation, corporate control of knowledge and what we can do to encourage a shift towards more open practices. This post will focus on the progress in opening up research worldwide, but also bring to the fore some areas where commercialisation may be able to serve the public interest. Can commercialising research ever be for public good?

Last year in support of the theme, we launched our Citizen Science Community! It was the culmination of a lot of work from the team in the Office for Open Science and Scholarship. Our approach to Citizen Science at UCL foregrounds the need to prioritise community interests and aiming to make everything we do as inclusive as possible and integrate as many subject areas as we can.

We also explored how Creative Commons (CC) licences promote open, reusable research, making scholarly outputs accessible to a wider audience—from researchers to the general public.

International Open Access Week has created a list of profiles of global institutions showcasing how Open Science communities are embedding principles of shared knowledge and equitable access into their practices: visit the International Open Access Week list of Theme Profiles.

Continuing the Discussion in 2024:

As we move forward, OA Week 2024 offers the opportunity to build on the 2023 theme and further explore how community-based approaches can coexist with commercial interests in ways that serve both the research community and the public. Turning this dialogue into concrete action is essential for achieving the goals of Open Science—making knowledge accessible and equitable for everyone.

So, is there ever a scenario where commercialisation of research can work for community? After all, it is possible to share the outputs of research openly while also selling them as a product, for example in software. It is possible and even fairly common in some areas to make the underlying code open source but sell access to supported versions or additional features that can be used by companies and businesses that are unable to support products themselves. There are many examples of this, from the underlying code supporting Android phones and Chrome browsers to the Linux operating system and, also the ePrints repository software that we use here at UCL.

As another example, this time from within UCL itself is the Ventura CPAP Machine developed during 2020 at the height of the pandemic. The designs for the machine were made available free of charge via the UCLB licensing system. This enabled limitations to be put in place for who could use the designs, preventing companies from profiteering from the design while making it available to hospitals and other charitable organisations to build and test their own free of charge. It has always been UCL’s position that profit is not the end game, going back as far as Jeremy Bentham, the spiritual founder of UCL, who believed that education should be more widely available, a core underpinning value of UCL and the Office for Open Science and Scholarship today.

This year’s Open Access Week theme aligns with some of the behind-the-scenes work we’re doing to explore the relationship between openness and commercialisation and investigate scenarios where they may not be as much in conflict as the theme suggests. Keep an eye out for the report and recommendations coming later this academic year!