Smith Libraries Open Education Initiative (OEI) Grant Award is accepting applications and inquiries. The grants provide funding for instructors to adopt, adapt, or review Open Educational Resources. OER are teaching materials released with an open license, which allows for their free revision and redistribution with attribution to the creator of the original work.

Find out about OER grant opportunities on our OER Research Guide, or join an OER info session  on January 21, 2026 at 12:30 p.m. 

Textbook Review Grant

Rolling OER Review grant incentives provides funding to instructors to review an OER for inclusion in the Open Textbook Library. The goal of the OER Review grant is to encourage use, awareness, and to participate in the public good of improving assessment and quality of OERs. Upon completion, faculty members will receive $250 for their review. The textbook review grant is open to all Smith instructors teaching credit bearing courses.

Complete this form to get started!

Alternative Materials Grant

The Alternative Materials grants provide funding for instructors to adopt Open Educational Resources for their required course materials. ​​The goal of the Alternative Materials Grant is to encourage instructional innovation and enhance the scholarship of teaching and learning at Smith College by providing instructors with the time and resources they need to redesign their courses around the use of OER while lowering the cost of college for students. This is a competitive grant in the amount of $1000 per course.

Eligibility: Any primary instructor of record for Smith College credit-bearing undergraduate or graduate courses is eligible for these awards.

Alternative Materials Grant Application Criteria Rubric [Google doc]

Expectations: All Alternative Materials Grant recipients must:

• Attend OER an information workshop or schedule a consultation.
• In-class brief focus group facilitated by the OER Team to quantitatively assess student perspective of OER use in the course.
• Submit a brief report [Google doc] reflecting on the experience of using open/alternative textbook and the outcomes after the first semester of implementation.
• Provide a copy of the revised syllabus or course outline used for the class for possible inclusion in Smith ScholarWorks.

Application for Alternative Materials Grant [Google form]

Adapt OER

If you are interested in adapting an OER please reach out to Scholarly Communications Librarian, Jessica Ryan for information.

Application for Adaptions of OER [Google form]

For more information about the grants, see the OER Grant Opportunities page on our OER subject guide.

Contact

Jessica Ryan, Scholarly Communications Librarian: scholarworks@smith.edu