Teaching Innovations in College Algebra

Through the use of open educational resources (OER), active learning approaches and adaptive courseware that allows students to review and develop the requisite mathematical skills, Oregon State University faculty have implemented bold new solutions to improve student retention, performance and engagement in mathematics classes at OSU.

This collaborative breakthrough was funded by a Gates Foundation grant through the Association of Public and Land-Grant Universities, as well as a grant from OSU Open Educational Resources to develop open course materials.

Quantifying improved student success

Year-over-year comparative results have been encouraging, revealing clear drops in DFWU rates (grades of D, F, Withdrawal or Unsatisfactory) in both MTH 103 – Algebraic Reasoning and MTH 111 – College Algebra.

  • MTH 111 (on campus): 34.9% to 27.5% (7.4% drop)
  • MTH 111 (online): 67.3% to 43.9% (23.4% drop)
  • MTH 103 (on campus): 32.9% to 19.3% (13.6% drop)

Students attended class more consistently, engaged with course content at higher levels, used tools like DESMOS (see the menus below) to check their understanding, and reported enjoying the class.

Access the OER

A group of seven at Oregon State known as Team Math – mathematics instructors Sara Clark, Scott Peterson, Lyn Riverstone, Dan Rockwell, Katy Williams and David Wing, along with Elizabeth Jones of OSU's Equal Opportunities Program – spent more than 300 hours across several months on the redesign of college algebra and authoring new course notebooks and activities. You can access them here:

Open-source materials for MTH 103 – Algebraic Reasoning

In this OSU course, students learn about graphing data, functions, rate of change, linear equations and more. Access the open materials below to review, use, remix and implement to impact student learning and success.

Open materials for MTH 111 – College Algebra

This OSU baccalaureate core course explores polynomial equations and inequalities, polynomial functions and graphs, elementary mathematic modeling and more.


Contact Team Math at OSU

Team Math's goal is to facilitate student success for all mathematics students while being of service to other math instructors, faculty and staff. Feel free to contact the team if you have questions about our open educational resources. Additionally, learn more about Team Math's achievements in advancing student learning and the recognition received for these efforts.

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