Jamie Hazlitt is the Librarian for Collection Development and Evaluation at the William H. Hannon Library at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles, CA. In this role, she leads the librarian-faculty liaison program, runs the library’s course adopted text e-book initiative, and serves ex-officio on the faculty library committee, where she is situated to further the movement towards increased OER adoption and creation at LMU. Through the SPARC Leadership Program in 2019-2020, she increased her fluency and broadened her network and skill-set related to education, outreach, and advocacy for open education.
Through Jamie’s capstone project, she launched a pilot grant program funded through LMU’s Office of the Provost. The LMU Open & Affordable Textbook Initiative (OATI) grant is designed to incentivize and empower two or more faculty in the same academic department to explore innovative and less costly ways to deliver quality learning materials to their students through adoption of open educational resources, materials already licensed by the library and university, or other free digital materials available for educational use. In addition, this initiative introduces faculty to the benefits that open educational resources (OER) can bring to the teaching and learning experience beyond affordability, including materials that put greater emphasis on access, inclusion, interactivity, and student success. The 2020 departmental grant of $10,000 – administered to individual faculty involved in the project at the discretion of the department/program chair – was awarded to three faculty from the LMU Art History Department, who together committed to exploring converting course materials for six courses in AY20-21.
In addition to the grant materials, her community resource also includes email templates and interview questions to facilitate outreach and inquiry to a variety of OER stakeholders on campus.