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Open Educational Resources (OER)

This guide provides information for users who want to learn more about Open Educational Resources and their value for teaching and learning.

Interpreting Creative Commons Licenses

Creative Commons Licenses
Creative Commons licenses provide an easy to understand and standardized way to indicate what constitutes permissible use to authored material under copyright law. They use simple graphics to demonstrate the different permissions of a work under a CC BY license.

Creative Commons Icons

Public Domain Mark: Free of known copyright restrictions due to the age of the work or federally-authored work.

Public Domain Zero License: The author has intentionally waived their copyright.

BY (Attribution): You must give appropriate credit to the creator, provide a link to the license, and indicate if changes were made.

SA (Share Alike): You may modify the original work but must publish the modifications under the original license.

NC (Non-Commercial): You may not use the material for commercial purposes.

ND (No Derivatives): No derivatives or adaptations of the work are permitted.

Creative Commons Permissions & Restrictions

The licenses above may be combined to expand or limit permissions as demonstrated in the chart below:

Source: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Creative_Commons_Licenses.png

The Creative Commons License Spectrum

Source: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Creative_commons_license_spectrum.svg