Reducing Textbook Costs with OER’s

At APUS, our model covered textbook costs—but scaling that approach wasn’t sustainable long-term.

At the American Public University System (APUS), where textbooks were provided at no cost to students, course material expenses still placed a heavy burden on the institution.

What We Did

As Provost and Senior Vice President, I sought to increase sustainability by reducing the financial impact of textbook provision without sacrificing content quality.

I led the university-wide implementation of Open Educational Resources (OER) in high-enrollment undergraduate courses. This included faculty development, licensing reviews, and a scalable quality assurance process. We paired OER integration with instructional design improvements and LMS optimization.

Result

More than 90% of undergrad courses converted to OER, saving $32M institutionally and offering a nationally recognized model of mission-driven innovation.