Problem: The U.S. cannot train healthcare workers fast enough to meet demand. Cost and access to course materials is one bottleneck slowing program expansion, particularly at community colleges and regional institutions that run most of these programs.

Why Open: Open clinical and course materials can be shared across programs and updated on a research timeline, allowing more institutions to launch or expand programs without building curriculum from scratch.

Problem: AI literacy has become a national workforce priority backed by federal mandates and state legislation, but the curriculum being built to meet that mandate is proprietary, rapidly outdated, and often produced by the same vendors whose tools are being taught.

Why Open: Open AI literacy curriculum can be updated by the community as the technology evolves, adapted for specific institutional contexts, and developed without vendor influence over what gets taught.

Problem: Millions of high school students taking college courses have no access to the financial aid systems that make proprietary course materials workable for traditional college students. There is no FAFSA buffer, no institutional aid, and some billing programs result in high school students getting locked out.

Why Open: Open materials eliminate course material costs entirely for a population that has no other mechanism to absorb them, and they require none of the institutional infrastructure that dual enrollment programs rarely have.

Problem: Employers need workers with specific, verifiable skills and institutions need to produce them faster than traditional programs allow, but the emerging microcredential ecosystem is consolidating around commercial platforms whose credentials only travel within their own ecosystems.

Why Open: Open microcredentials combining shared curriculum with open recognition standards can be adopted, adapted, and issued by any institution without platform fees, making quality credentialing accessible at scale.

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Since this is an open board with no way to enforce duplicate responses, upvotes and downvotes will be used to guide the ranking of priorities.

Why Open: Open content and open pedagogy make coursework tied to real audiences and real practice possible at scale, turning authentic assessment into shared infrastructure instead of something each faculty member invents alone. 

Why Open: Open data infrastructure and shared standards let institutions collectively build and access the evidence base that accountability requirements demand, rather than ceding that infrastructure to proprietary systems.

Problem: Pell Grant eligibility was restored for incarcerated students in 2023, creating real demand for prison education programs, but the commercial course materials model is architecturally incompatible with carceral settings — no internet access, no account management, no per-copy licensing.

Why Open: Open materials can be preloaded on devices, printed, and reproduced without login requirements or licensing fees, making them the only course materials model that actually works in this environment.

Why Open: Open content, open data standards, and open infrastructure let institutions build and govern their own systems instead of renting access to someone else's.

Problem: How institutions procure course materials is changing rapidly, as automatic billing programs replace campus-based purchasing and bundle materials costs into student fees. The result is a procurement environment that favors established vendor relationships over open alternatives, regardless of cost or quality.

Why Open: Textbook procurement could be moving closer to departments and libraries that have an interest in managing content sustainably and openly, rather than being outsourced to vendors with an interest in preserving the status quo.

Problem: Enrollment is declining and public confidence in the value of a degree is falling with it, driven partly by the rising cost of tuition and course materials. Students and families are asking whether the return is worth the price.

Why Open: Open education lets institutions answer with curriculum built around their own students instead of a generic textbook, customized and localized in ways that show care in the design rather than just cutting cost. AAC&U recently named OER a high-impact practice, giving institutions peer-reviewed evidence this belongs in their student success strategy.

This board will be updated weekly throughout the fall as new ideas are submitted through listening sessions. Check back to see how the list evolves and continue to weigh in.

For more information on the Open Education National Priorities Process visit the Open Education Association website.

A strong national priority meets the following criteria:

• Identifies a problem that is present in the national discourse among education leaders, policymakers, and/or funders

• Offers open resources or practices as a compelling solution that cannot be achieved through closed approaches

• Supports a strategy and specific goals that are achievable within three years

• Has existing groundwork or interest underway within the open education field