West Virginia University Potomac State College assistant professor of chemistry, Ganesh Ghimire, PhD, was recently awarded an Open Education Resources grant. The OER grant opportunity is offered through the West Virginia Higher Education Policy Commission and the Community and Technical College System.
Increasing cost of textbooks and other course materials have long-been a discouraging factor in the formula for students’ success. Additionally, the economic challenges created by the COVID-19 pandemic this year have worsened the situation.
“I’ve been trying to reduce these costs to my students by adopting free or low-cost textbooks and materials, while at the same time being careful not to compromise the quality of the materials used,” Ghimire said.
The goal of the OER grant is to encourage innovation and experimentation among instructors for the purpose of discovering enhanced techniques of delivering learning materials as well as finding more cost-effective methods through open educational resources.
“This grant will allow me to develop an OER chemistry course which will be implemented by Fall 2021. I’m currently working with the Open Learning Initiative from Carnegie Mellon University to develop such a course,” he added.
Ghimire, who is originally from Nepal, a small Himalayan country between India and China, has been in the U.S. since 2011. He earned his PhD in organic chemistry from WVU in 2018, the same year he began teaching at Potomac State College.