A Sustainable Way Forward: A Team-based Approach to Tackling Textbook Access and Affordability Issues During the “New Normal”

Abstract

Like all institutions across North America, The University of Alberta Library has experienced dramatic impacts on our services and collections due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Students at our large research institution have historically relied heavily on the Library’s extensive reserve collection of textbooks and other required course materials, the lending of which was suddenly suspended during a mid-term emergency closure. This column will highlight our team-based approach to aggressively promoting OER to our campus community: from engaging public service desk staff in new roles as their work suddenly shifted, strategizing with our collections team on identifying high impact courses, and establishing a communications approach with librarians. We will discuss how our “by-the-seat-of-our-pants” initial approach has evolved into a functional team with a diverse set of strengths, and a responsive workflow that incorporates OER services as an integrated component of existing library processes.