Virginia's Academic Library Consortium

VIVA Open Adopt Grants

VIVA Open Adopt Grants provide awards of $2,000 to individual instructors to support the time it takes to integrate existing open or no-cost materials into a syllabus, and to ensure that the results of those efforts are widely available to Virginia educators.

Instructors interested in applying for this opportunity are encouraged to explore VIVA's repository of Open Education Resources, VIVA Open, to discover open resources that may be of use in their courses. Applicants do not need to choose a resource listed in VIVA Open to apply for the grant.  

Preference will be given to projects that incorporate a VIVA-funded open educational resource (OER) into their courses. A list of VIVA-funded projects can be found here: https://vivalib.org/va/open/grants/VIVA-funded. While the committee has a stated preference for funding the adoption of OER funded by VIVA, they recognize that those projects are limited in number and applications for the adoption of other materials are welcomed.

Team and departmental adoptions, as well as projects seeking to adapt or create new Open Educational Resources, should apply for the larger scale VIVA Open Course Grants.

Important Dates

The current round of VIVA Open Adopt Grants was announced on October 7, 2022. Applications are due December 7, 2022 via email at vivaopen@gmu.edu. Notification of award recipients will take place by February 17, 2023. Adopted course materials must be piloted in the classroom by summer, 2024.

Informational webinars are scheduled for the following dates. Advance registration at the provided link is required:

November 2, 2022, 10:00 am: https://vivalib.libcal.com/event/9736929

November 30, 2022, 11:00 am: https://vivalib.libcal.com/event/9737401

Questions about all VIVA Open grants can be sent to vivaopen@gmu.edu.

Expectations

Each awarded grant will receive support from VIVA in adopting existing OER, including access to Pressbooks, ISKME’s Open Author Tool, and copyright consultations. Recipients will have the option (but not the requirement) to meet with the VIVA grant coordinator and participate in the annual VIVA grant recipient kickoff meeting. Grant recipients will be expected to complete the following activities:

• Institutional sign-off on a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) provided by the VIVA Central Office, using the project proposal as a statement of work.
• Completion of a final project report, including provision of data on impact on student success and a course syllabus with resource links. The report must include overall changes in Drop/Fail/Withdraw (DFW) rates and student performance (examples: grades, standardized tests, other learning outcomes assessments), if available.
• Ancillary materials must be created under a Creative Commons license and will be made accessible through the VIVA Open shared repository platform. Exceptions for other, more restrictive open licenses, including for test bank questions and homework materials, will be made on discussion with VIVA. Ancillary materials developed in authoring platforms that have proprietary features that are unable to be accommodated in the VIVA shared repository should include plans for how that content can be shared.
• Syllabi for associated courses must be provided to the VIVA Open Syllabus Bank and openly licensed for access and use by other educators.
• All intellectual property rights for content created remain fully with the creator, but VIVA requires permission to host the content in perpetuity.
• Participation in VIVA-related communications, including post-project surveys.