Cal Poly Humboldt
IN-24: Innovation A

The Dean of the Library, Cyril Oberlander, is the Sustainable Learning Coordinator. This means he has received $70,000 from the Chancellor’s Office to help faculty locate and implement Open Educational Resources (OER’s). OER's are free or very low cost materials that make it possible for students to avoid purchasing costly books from regular retailers (such as the Bookstore). This is a resource for students that makes their education more affordable. The Affordable Learning Solutions initiative from the Chancellor’s Office has funded HSU’s Sustainable Learning Program to support faculty adoption and evaluation of open textbooks, open educational resources (OER), or self-authored materials that faculty are willing to openly license. The HSU Sustainable Learning Program will support faculty through its partnership with the Library, College of eLearning & Extended Education, Student Disability Resource Center, Bookstore and others to help faculty decrease the cost of an education for our students and provide high-quality, peer-reviewed learning materials. In addition, HSU seeks to democratize access to knowledge with tools to communicate, share, educate, listen and learn and is doing this via the creation of a digital media lab. The Digital Media Lab is located on the Library’s Main Floor just steps away from the front entrance, Checkout Desk and Library Café. The DML includes: five digital cameras with tripods and external microphones; three iMac desktop computers; three PC computers; and six subscriptions to Adobe Creative Suite. The DML gives HSU students the tools, training and professional software to edit video and photos, build web sites, create apps, design logos and layout magazines and books. Beyond creating digital media workshops for screen capture, text/web, audio, and/or video production, the HSU Library also initiates programs that encourage learning digital storytelling and digital media productions in partnership with interested departments. Digital storytelling that incorporates video, photography, arts and sciences builds extremely important skills that students learn by doing. Digital Storytelling workshops guide students in crafting thoughtful examinations of their subject areas that can connect with the world in transformational ways. Whether a student is presenting botanical research, a historical essay, or a social justice issue, their videos, blogs, the Digital Media Lab empowers students to more deeply connect with the content of any project.

Find more information about the Digital Media Lab at http://libguides.humboldt.edu/c.php?g=511845&p=3497670 and http://library.humboldt.edu/giving/dml.html