# What are Open Educational Resources?

Open Educational Resources (OER), in a broad sense, are freely accessible digital materials available for reuse within education. Open Educational Resources are an important part of Open Education.

Open Education is about sharing knowledge, as well as building on already existing knowlegde, with the aim of global participation in Open Educational Practices and free access to high-quality Open Educational Resources. To acchieve this, it aims to remove barriers to collaboration between scientists, educators and others. These include issues such as high costs, outdated and redundant materials and legal regulations. Collaboration is the key word, because sharing knowledge, insights and information on which new knowledge, skills and ideas can be based is the basic characteristic of education.

One feature of Open Educational Resources is that they are freely accessible. Permission for reuse and the conditions for reuse are often laid down in licences.