Faculty: This page contains resources to help you supplement your assigned texts with free/low-cost material, or transition your class completely to no- or low-cost readings. If you're thinking about creating your own text, there's information about that here as well. Your subject librarian can help you, too!
Switch to an Open/Low-Cost Textbook
There are many inexpensive or free, high-quality alternatives to traditional textbooks available to instructors. Open textbooks are created by disciplinary specialists—sometimes originally for use in their own courses, sometimes expressly for the purpose of filling a perceived need for high-quality, affordable instructional material.
George Mason University has developed a tool that will search across multiple databases of free and low-cost texts — enter your subject area and give it a try, or browse the separate resources listed below.
Below are some resources listing open textbooks and other educational materials. Check out the Amazon-style reviews of many of these resources to see other instructors' opinions - just click on the titles!
OER Collections: Textbooks
- British Columbia Open Campus Textbook listOffers access to hundreds of open textbooks available for use or modification.
- Cornell OpenProvides open access to new books and classic out-of-print titles.
- LibreTexts - University of California, DavisProvides access to collaboratively developed open textbooks. Focuses primarily on the sciences but there are some social sciences and humanities materials.
- MERLOT: Multimedia Educational Resource for Learning and Online Teaching - California State University"MERLOT is a curated collection of free and open online teaching, learning, and faculty development services contributed and used by an international education community."
- MIT OpenCourseWare Online TextbooksMIT OpenCourseWare (OCW) is a web-based publication of most MIT course content. OCW is freely available for use.
- NCBI Bookshelf - National Institute of HealthFree online access to books and documents in life science and healthcare, from the National Center for Biotechnology Information.
- NOBA textbooksTextbooks compiled from Noba modules for common courses. Textbooks can be customized to fit users' needs.
- NYU Press Open Square"Open Square is NYU Press’s platform for publishing and reading open access books."
- OpenStax College - Rice UniversityOpenStax provides peer-reviewed textbooks in a growing range of subject areas. Digital copies are free, or low-cost printed copies can be purchased.
- Open SUNY textbooksA service that provides access to a broad array of open textbooks to help incorporate OER into the classroom.
- Open Textbooks for EngineeringThis guide aggregates links to open (freely available) textbooks from ~20 different open educational resource websites and organizes it by engineering discipline.
- Open Textbook Library - University of MinnesotaA directory of open textbooks in many disciplines. Some of the textbooks feature Amazon-style reviews from faculty.
- PDXOpen - Portland State UniversityPDXOpen is an open access textbook publishing project supporting Portland State faculty who create open access textbooks. Textbooks are freely available for use.
- Penn State University Press UnlockedA new open access initiative offering humanities and social sciences titles.
- Saylor Academy Open TextbooksThese books are available for use, revision, and sharing under open licenses.
- Virginia Tech Open TextbooksThese open textbooks are free and licensed for redistribution. Some open textbooks are also licensed for modification.
- Wikibooks - Wikimedia FoundationProvides access to a little over 3,000 open access textbooks. Anyone is able to edit content.
OER Collections: Teach Without Textbooks
- OER CommonsOER Commons is a digital library of open educational resources available to the public.
- Galileo Open Learning Materials - University System of GeorgiaThis platform brings together open educational resources from the University System of Georgia, including open textbooks and ancillary materials.
OER Collections: Move Beyond Text
- HippoCampusHippoCampus.org offers free multimedia content such as videos, animations, and simulations on general education subjects to middle-school and high-school teachers and college professors and students.
- Phet: Interactive Simulations for Science and Math - University of Colorado BoulderThis project at the University of Colorado Boulder creates free interactive math and science simulations.
- Creative Commons SearchFind free content in the public domain and under Creative Commons licenses.
- Simulations and Virtual LabsList of mostly open and free interactive resources across multiple STEM disciplines: engineering, life sciences, medicine and health sciences, physical sciences and mathematics, and social and behavioral sciences. Compiled by Colorado School of Mines.
Create Your Own Textbook!
If you're thinking about starting from scratch or adapting an existing open textbook, the University of British Columbia provides some good information:
Use the Library's E-Books as Textbooks
Did you know that the library holds over 500,000 licensed e-books in a wide variety of disciplines? Many of these books permit unlimited simultaneous use, making them good options for assigned course readings.
Whether you have a specific book in mind or want to see what's available on a particular topic, the best place to start is Scholar OneSearch:
Search Scholar OneSearch
To filter your results so you see only e-books, choose "e-Books" under Filter My Results.
When you find a book that interests you, click on the Online Access link. If access to the e-book is limited to one or a few simultaneous users, this information will be listed:
While you can certainly still assign a reading from this book to your students, they may have to wait their turn to access it - just like if it were a physical copy on reserve in the library. But an e-book that doesn't mention limited access will not have this problem. (Interested in seeing if it's possible to increase the number of simultaneous users for a book you've found? Contact your subject librarian!)
Another place you can start your search is our Books & E-Books Directory, which is browsable as an A-Z list of our major e-book packages, or you can limit the list to specific disciplines.
To link to an e-book in Canvas or other site or email, you will need a "permalink" — a URL that is not tied to a specific search session. Click here for our guide to Finding and Creating Permalinks.
There are many e-books in the public domain, too - check out the Internet Archive and Project Gutenberg for millions of texts.