Four OER Projects Receive Open Textbook Pilot Awards
The Department of Education has announced four awards in the fiscal year 2026 Open Textbook Pilot competition. All four grantees come from the open education community and have received previous Open Textbook Pilot grants. The new projects will produce openly licensed textbooks and course materials for professional-technical programs, early childhood education, communication courses, and high-enrollment general education across Washington, Wisconsin, New Mexico, and Oregon.
Congratulations to the grantees, and also to everyone who submitted an application on the tight timeline this summer.
Washington State Board for Community and Technical Colleges: Open ProfTech
The Washington State Board for Community and Technical Colleges will expand its Open ProfTech initiative with six new open textbooks and supporting course materials for professional-technical programs in high-demand fields, including pharmacy technology, criminal justice, dental assisting, and manufacturing. This is SBCTC’s third Open Textbook Pilot award, bringing nearly $6 million in federal investment to open educational resources for professional-technical programs across Washington’s community and technical colleges. Each textbook will include Canvas course cartridges and ancillary materials to make adoption easier for faculty, and the project will also create a production toolkit that faculty can use to develop open textbooks of their own. Workforce and industry advisors will help inform the materials, and adoption and student impact will be tracked through Washington’s statewide OER course marking system.
Chippewa Valley Technical College: Bright Beginnings
Chippewa Valley Technical College will work with all 16 Wisconsin Technical College System colleges to create six open textbooks and ancillary materials for early childhood education. Faculty will lead development and review, with a focus on accessible and interactive materials. The consortium anticipates that more than 9,000 students will enroll in course sections using the new materials, with savings of about $696 per student. That amounts to $6.3 million saved over the term of the grant, a number that will grow each year. Advisors include WisTech Open, the University of Wisconsin-Stout, the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire, the Midwestern Higher Education Compact, and local school and childcare partners. After the grant ends, the books will be available to early childhood education programs nationwide. For more information, or to sign-up to get involved, visit the Bright Beginnings web page.
University of New Mexico: NMOER Consortium Phase II
The second phase of the New Mexico OER Consortium brings the University of New Mexico together with five other colleges and universities across the state. The first phase has already saved students $1.86 million and reduced DFW rates by 6.4 percentage points. Phase II will adapt and create OER for high-enrollment general education and workforce courses. All materials will go through a four-stage review covering quality, accessibility, licensing, and workforce alignment. Materials will be published through the UNM OER Hub, Pressbooks, and a statewide community of practice. The consortium expects to reach about 39,400 students and save them nearly $2.8 million during the grant period alone.
Oregon Higher Education Coordinating Commission: Open Textbooks in High-Enrollment Courses for Oregon's Future Workforce
The Oregon Higher Education Coordinating Commission and Open Oregon Education Resources will lead a consortium of 12 community colleges and universities to eliminate textbook costs in four high-enrollment Communication courses that are part of Oregon's common course numbering system. The new textbooks and course packs will follow statewide learning outcomes and teach workplace communication skills. A 12-member workforce advisory board will review them alongside faculty peer reviewers. Partners include the Oregon Community College Distance Learning Association and RMC Research. The project expects savings of more than $2 million per year once the materials are adopted statewide after the grant.
What's Next
Congress is now deciding the Open Textbook Pilot's budget for fiscal year 2027. Contact your House and Senate representatives to ask their support for continued funding and share why open textbooks matter for the students you serve.
