Why would institutions and/or individuals want to share their materials in this way?

Why would individual faculty members want to give away their course materials?

Create Open Educational Resources (OER) for Library instruction, Staff training and Professional  Development. Resource for staff and faculty has been available through the MERLOT Project (Multimedia Educational
Resources for Learning and Online Teaching) which began in 1997 and

• Why would institutions want to share their educational materials in this way?
• Why would individual faculty members want to give away their course materials?

We currently live in an era of the greatest secrecy and the greatest openness of all time.  So many people are concerned about privacy, security, and controlling intellectual property.  In my first 'real' job, in orientation we watched a video about controlling intellectual property by keeping our desks locked, papers put away, and avoiding discussion in public places.  The video was based on A Christmas Carol, and near the end of the film the main character discovers that because of his thoughtless actions the company has gone out of business and the last few employees are huddled around a fire in the lobby of the empty building.  When he awoke from his horrible dream, the main character resolved to be a better employee.

What role can libraries and librarians play in Open Education?

As Loreli has already pointed out, one of the main ways librarians can be involved in Open Education is by being an advocate on their campuses and the larger community. Belliston (2009) describes a couple of ways they can do this. Some campuses have centers that help faculty develop instructional materials – librarians can educate the instructional designers at these centers about Open Educational Resources so they can help faculty develop their own OERs. Another idea he describes is notifying faculty about new OERs the same way librarians notify them of new books or other library resources in their subject. Librarians can use their evaluation skills that they use in their existing collection development duties to distinguish high-quality OERs to recommend.

What role can libraries and librarians play in the Open Education Movement?
Stephen Downes’ believes that humanity needs every one of its people to survive and that the ultimate empowerment of education lies in each person’s ability to create their own education. As he said, open education is not a gift, it is an inherent right. One role of the librarian is that of facilitator, assisting each person’s journey to create their own education.

Why would institutions and/or individuals want to share their educational materials in this way?