Open CourseWare

This summer, a team of students led by Tim Lauer have been working to make OpenCourseWare a reality for UW-Eau Claire. The team met with and recruited professors, collected course materials, and developed the website. The site, entitled Open.Eau Claire, was launched on September 14 with ten UW-Eau Claire courses currently available and more on the way.

The purpose of the OpenCourseWare initiative is to promote faculty teaching, allow current students to preview coursework prior to registering or attending a class, allow prospective students to see what UW-Eau Claire courses are like, and to provide lifelong learners a way to further their understanding of a field.

Open.Eau Claire started as a challenge from Ray French, then Student Body President. French asked Student Senators to present three big ideas that would help UW-Eau Claire. After having seen MIT’s OpenCourseWare site, Tim suggested a similar idea for our campus and began working to make it happen.

Tim went on to become the Student Body President of the 52nd session and continued work on Open.Eau Claire with then ITC Director Andrew Cooan. With guidance from Charles Probst and Craig Mey (both of LTS), and many others along the way, Tim led students in project planning, obtaining funding, and the hiring and supervising of three students to work over the summer.

Resources

• Visit the OpenCourseWare consortium website.
• Visit UW-Eau Claire’s OpenCourseWare site
• For more information or to have your course content added, contact Tim Lauer, Tom Holtan, Maxel Schultz, or Nate Brunett.