Upcoming Events
UNM OE Week Events
March 2 | 4 - 6 p.m. | Zimmerman 254
Zines & Paper Crafts Crafternoon
Want an afternoon study or work break? Join us for a crafternoon celebrating Open Educational Resources and indie publishing.
Bring your own project or come try one of ours for free, including Zine making and paper crafts. No registration needed!
Hosted by UNM OER and LRE-U Engagement
March 3 & 4 | 11 - 1 p.m. | Smith Plaza (Between Zimmerman and the SUB)
Join UNM OER and the Friends of the Public Library for a free book giveaway! The Friends will bring a wide selection of books for UNM students to take home.
Along with free books, you’ll also learn about the power of Open Educational Resources (OER):
- Open Educational Resources (OER) are teaching and learning materials that anyone can freely use, adapt, and share. OER lower costs for students, expand access to course materials, and give educators the flexibility to customize content.
Stop by to:
- Pick up a free book to enjoy.
- There will be books in many languages to choose form: Arabic, English, French, German, Japanese, Mandarin, Russian, Spanish, and Swahili
- Learn how OER is transforming access to knowledge.
- Explore how open licensing makes it possible to reuse and remix educational and research materials.
- Get details on other Open Education Week events happening across campus.
March 4 | 2 - 3 p.m. | Zoom
Advocating for OER, One Step at a Time
Learn how higher education institutions across New Mexico are advancing open educational resources through advocacy. Panelists from Central New Mexico Community College, Eastern New Mexico University, Northern New Mexico College, Santa Fe Community College, and the University of New Mexico will discuss what OER advocacy looks like in different institutional settings, large and small. The discussion will cover short- and long-term planning, plus, how to create smaller, focused activities that can yield tangible results. Attendees will leave with concrete ideas for sustaining OER awareness, working together with faculty, and increasing Open Educational Practices (OEP).
Panelists
- Elisha Allen, Director, Online Strategies and Academic Technologies, UNM
- Christine Goshorn, Executive Director, Innovation & Instructional Support, CNM
- Jennifer Jordan, Principal Investigator, NMOER; OER Librarian and Assistant Professor, UNM
- Valerie Nye, Library Director, SFCC
- Martin Shupla, Library Director, NNMC
- Laura Wight, Director of Golden Library, ENMU
March 5 | 10 - 11 a.m. | Zoom
You’ve likely heard about OER and how it can save students money. But did you also know that OER can increase student engagement and retention? The 2022 Florida Student Survey found that 53% of the 13,000 students they surveyed did not purchase a required textbook for a course due to its cost. Because of textbook costs, forty-three percent of students in the survey took fewer courses, and twenty-four percent of students surveyed reported dropping out of a course (Florida Virtual Campus 2022).
The New Mexico Open Educational Resources Consortium, or the NMOER Consortium, is holding three workshops this fall to help NM educators find free, open, high-quality resources to use in their classes.
This workshop will also cover the different ways educators can integrate these resources into their courses. All New Mexico educators, students, staff, and administrators are invited to learn about how to get started with OER.
Presented by Jennifer Jordan, Principal Investigator, NMOER; OER Librarian and Assistant Professor, UNM
March 5 | 1 - 3 p.m. | Zimmerman 254
Zines & Paper Crafts Crafternoon
Want an afternoon study or work break? Join us for a crafternoon celebrating Open Educational Resources and indie publishing.
Bring your own project or come try one of ours for free, including Zine making and paper crafts. No registration needed!
Hosted by UNM OER and LRE-U Engagement
March 6 | 11 - 12 p.m. | Zoom
I wrote this...For You: Framing Audience(s) for Your Open Education Resources
Determining who will read an open education resource (OER) is not a straightforward question. Sure, there are your students, but what are their needs? Also, placing your OER out into circulation brings the opportunity for new audiences. Who are they? What are your obligations to these audiences as you write/revise and OER? In this presentation we will think with a little bit of rhetorical theory about audience but also talk practically about how to think about and respond to audiences. Even if you have not (yet) written an OER, this presentation might be useful for broader conversations about (digital) instructional materials and their potential for relational responding to learners.
Presented by Dr. Mary Rice, Associate Professor, Literacy and Language Arts (LLA)
NMOER Community of Practice Meetings
The NMOER Community of Practice meetings are held Fridays from 10:30–11:30 a.m. and provide a friendly, informal space to connect with colleagues working on or thinking about OER. Participants are welcome to drop in at any time—there’s no expectation to stay the whole hour. These gatherings are a chance to share project updates, ask questions, discuss challenges, and exchange ideas. The goal is to create an inclusive community that supports one another and offers a sounding board to move forward.
UNM Tech Days 2026
The New Mexico OER Consortium (NMOER), is excited to participate in Tech Days at UNM. Presentation times are still being finalized. Please check back for updated schedules. Presentation and presenter details are available below.
Tech Days is a free, in-person event that offers no-cost sessions, discussions, and hands-on demos of current and future technological innovations at the University. This year during Tech Days, faculty who are actively integrating Open Educational Resources into their courses will present on their projects and curriculum during an OER Track at Tech Days on April 29th and April 30th.
The OER Track will be fully in person, bringing together post-secondary educators to learn directly from their peers about innovative approaches to integrating free and open resources into teaching and learning. Faculty teaching courses within New Mexico’s General Education Curriculum, as well as other undergraduate and graduate courses, will present materials that have been vetted, adopted, adapted, and created with New Mexico’s student population as the primary audience.
Presnetation & Presenter Details
The OER Evolution of US HIST 1110 & 1120
I will be demonstrating how over the course of the last year and a half, I have worked to develop both my US History 1 &2 courses into open educational resource based classes that have also expanded student accessibility.
Presented by Steve Martinez, Assistant Professor of History at SFCC. Dr. Martinez comes to SFCC with a background in Spanish Borderlands and New Mexico history. He was a visiting professor in the Chicano Studies Department at the University of New Mexico between 1997-2004. Currently he is an Assistant Professor of History at SFCC and is the Director of the Veterans Legacy Grant Program, and an adjunct for Central New Mexico College.
Bridging the Gap in the Age of AI
Explore how the use of open pedagogy and authentic assessments can better prepare college students for success in the age of AI. Authentic assessments offer meaningful opportunities for students to demonstrate their learning by incorporating reflections on their cultures, experiences, and strengths, moving beyond reliance on traditional testing.
Presented by Joseph Ulibarri, Ph.D., Black Education Act Curriculum Specialist & Erica Wheeler, Humanities Specialist.
As the Black Education Act Curriculum Specialist, Dr. Ulibarri is a passionate advocate for creating inclusive spaces where every individual's story is heard and valued. He is dedicated to fostering well-being and belonging for all, both in education and beyond. Dr. Ulibarri leads efforts at the New Mexico Public Education Department to integrate Black History within schools, support the recruitment and retention of Black educators in New Mexico, provide instructional supports and strategies for improving educational outcomes for Black students, and curate Open Educational Resources for use in K-12 classrooms. His research centers on culturally sustaining pedagogies in diverse classrooms.
Erica Wheeler has worked as an educator in New Mexico for two decades. Currently, she is the Humanities Specialist with the New Mexico Public Education Department where she supports social studies instruction and fine arts programming. Ms. Wheeler helped write the New Mexico Social Studies Standards and the New Mexico Instructional Scope for Social Studies. With an eye toward uplifting the cultural assets that students bring to school, she is thrilled to serve the students, families, and teachers of New Mexico. She holds a BA in philosophy from Wellesley College and an MA in education in Curriculum and Instruction from Highlands University.
Developing OER for AI-Assisted ECURE Framework
Explore how the ECURE framework leverages AI to enhance research skills training using Open Educational Resources. Learn strategies for integrating AI tools in student learning. Demonstrate interactive features teaching hypothesis formation, data interpretation, and scientific reasoning while addressing academic integrity and accessibility. Practical approaches for creating sustainable, openly licensed lab manuals that reduce costs and prepare students for AI-integrated research.
Presenteed by K. Joseph Ho, Director of Chemical Education. Dr. K. Joseph Ho is Director of Chemical Education in the Department of Chemistry & Chemical Biology at the University of New Mexico. He developed the ECURE (Expanded Course-based Undergraduate Research Experience) framework at UNM, transforming undergraduate curricula through active learning pedagogies and research-integrated courses. Dr. Ho has established innovative placement systems, developed research concept inventory assessments, and introduced research experiences in large enrollment General Chemistry labs. He regularly presents at national conferences and conducts educational research to improve STEM teaching and learning outcomes.
Open Education Mentoring Methods
Discover mentoring approaches supporting OER work at three New Mexico institutions: Central New Mexico Community College (CNM), Santa Fe Community College (SFCC), and the University of New Mexico (UNM). Speakers will describe how they guide faculty in adopting, adapting, and creating OER. Methods reflect institutional context, faculty needs, and resources, offering a comparative view of OER support across community colleges and a research university.
Presented by Aamna Nayar, Director, Department of Dental Health, Santa Fe Community College, Alex Sousa, Instructor, Spanish and Portuguese, Department of Modern Languages, Central New Mexico Community College, & Jennifer Jordan, OER Librarian and Assistant Professor, University of New Mexico.
Aamna Nayyar holds dental practice license in good standing with Dental Board of California and Pakistan Medical & Dental Council. She has been serving as the Director of Department of Dental Health at SFCC since 2003. Previous to that she worked as the adjunct faculty and ran a private solo dental practice. She is a reviewer and an author of dental publications including, contribution to the dental textbooks, and CE courses. She is a presenter at various regional, state, national and international seminars and conferences.
Alex Sousa teaches Spanish and Portuguese at CNM. As an OER faculty champion he assists faculty in choosing whether to create, adapt, or adopt, and enhancing their materials with interactive h5p resources.
Jennifer Jordan is a writer and assistant professor in the University Libraries at the University of New Mexico. In her current job at UNM, Jennifer is an Open Educational Resource (OER) Librarian and the principal investigator on a federal open textbook grant focused on growing open education in New Mexico.
NMOER Roadshow
OER Consultations
You can also learn more about Creative Commons licensing by contacting the OER Librarian in the University libraries:
Jennifer Jordan
Or you can schedule an appointment:
Explore OER Developments
Interested in keeping up with the latest developments in OER at UNM? Click the button down below to join the OER Initiative's mailing list. We will send information about upcoming OER-related opportunities, workshops, and events.
