Grants will allow materials sharing

FAYETTEVILLE — Combined grants of $25,500 will help four University of Arkansas, Fayetteville faculty members create or adopt educational materials to be shared freely at no cost to students or teachers.

UA’s University Libraries and Global Campus began last year offering grants to support what are known as open educational resources.

“This is a very time-consuming project that I probably would not have undertaken if it wasn’t because of this incentive,” said Julio Gea-Banacloche, a physics professor awarded $7,500 to develop materials to replace an introductory physics course textbook now costing about $150.

Others awarded $7,500 are Daniel Barth, a clinical assistant professor of science, technology, engineering and mathematics education, and Adam Rex Pope, a visiting assistant professor of English.

Luis Restrepo, a professor for the Department of World Languages, Literatures and Cultures, will receive a $3,000 award.

Barth said he’s written 320 pages of open educational resources and uses this for a UA course. He’s working on illustrating the text and making it available for free to primary and high school teachers to help them develop space science and astronomy lesson plans.

“I taught in high-poverty [school] districts for years. If I said I wanted a $400 textbook, my principal would have laughed at me,” Barth said. Once his project is finished, at no cost “the whole school can download it,” he said.