210: Open Education, System Building, and Rethinking “Catch-Up” with Megan Zara

TLDR: Open Educational ResourcesOERTeacher resourcesCurriculumHigher education / K-12This week on The No Name Paper, Meghan sits down with Meghan Zara, an OER librarian at the University of Texas at Arlington whose career path has moved through K–12 classrooms, district digital learning leadership, and now into higher education. If you’ve ever wondered what Open Educational Resources (OER) actually are—and why they matter for teachers, students, and access to education—this episode breaks it down.Meghan shares her journey from middle school English teacher to digital learning specialist to librarian working in open education. Along the way, the conversation explores:• What OER (Open Educational Resources) actually are• Why openly licensed curriculum can remove barriers for students• What K–12 and higher education often misunderstand about each other• Why “catching students up” after COVID might be the wrong goal• The importance of digital literacy vs. assuming students are “digital natives”• Building systems that actually care about peopleThe conversation also includes a round of Sustainable or Stressful, where Meghan weighs in on things like rewriting curriculum every summer, trying new tech tools every week, grading everything, and the sustainability of late-night Pinterest lesson redesigns.If you're interested in open education, teacher sustainability, or rethinking how we design learning, this episode offers practical insight and thoughtful perspective.Hi Meghan, absolutely. Here are my top three places to find free, openly licensed teaching and learning materials (OER):Pressbooks Directoryhttps://pressbooks.directory/A large catalog of open textbooks and OER created in Pressbooks across many disciplines. Great for finding remixable books and course-ready content.OER Commonshttps://www.oercommons.org/One of the largest OER repositories. Helpful filters for subject, education level, standards, and licensing/reuse permissions.MERLOT IIhttps://www.merlot.org/merlot/index.htmA long-running repository with a wide range of disciplines and material types (not just textbooks), plus peer reviews for many items.More options:You can also explore the “Where to Find OER” page from the UTA OER Subject Guide:https://libguides.uta.edu/utaoer/findoerWebsitehttps://meghanzara.comLinkedInSearch Meghan [email protected] to Find OER (Open Educational Resources)Connect with Meghan Zara