What Is the MERLOT Community and How Can I Join?

MERLOT is an international community of educators, learners, and researchers, and you can join it by signing up for a free account on merlot.org. Membership lets you add learning materials to the collection, create your own content, and take part in discipline-based communities. The site states that creating materials, adding materials, and joining the community are all free.

What the MERLOT Community Is

MERLOT describes itself as "an international community of educators, learners, and researchers" that provides access to curated online learning and support materials and content creation tools. The community is not just a materials library — it is organized around people and partnerships.

The site reports the following scale:

These figures give a sense of how large and active the community is, and they are drawn directly from the MERLOT homepage.

How the Community Is Organized

MERLOT groups its community into several overlapping structures:

• Academic Discipline Communities — communities organized around subject areas such as Arts, Business, Education, Health Sciences, Humanities, Mathematics and Statistics, Science and Technology, and Social Sciences.
• Academic Support Communities — communities focused on support services rather than a single discipline.
• Academic Partners — institutions that partner with MERLOT.
• Industry Partners — companies that partner with MERLOT, with a listed "Partner Benefits" and "Become a Partner" path.
• Members Around the World — the international membership base.

There is also a Workforce Development area and SkillsCommons, a related search and workforce solutions resource.

What You Can Do as a Member

Joining gives you several concrete ways to participate:

• Add a Material — submit an online learning material you have found or created to the MERLOT Collection.
• Create Materials with Content Builder — build accessible, scalable, multi-page websites. MERLOT states Content Builder is "entirely for free" and offers a video tutorial.
• Create a Course ePortfolio — assemble a course-level portfolio.
• Build Bookmark Collections — organize materials you want to keep.
• Participate in Peer Reviews — contribute to the community's review process.
• Engage with Learning Exercises and Virtual Speakers Bureau — additional community features listed in the site navigation.

Opportunities the Community Offers

Beyond contributing materials, MERLOT lists several programs and recognition paths:

• Peer Review Information — a structured review process for materials.
• MERLOT Awards — recognition within the community.
• Faculty Development — programs and resources for instructors.
• Policies and Practices — community guidelines.
• Our Conference — a MERLOT conference.
• MERLOT Programs and Projects — ongoing initiatives.
• Media Center and MERLOT Blog — news and updates.

How to Join

1. Go to merlot.org.
2. Select Sign Up (or Join Us).
3. Create your account. MERLOT states that joining, creating materials, and adding materials are all free.
4. Once registered, use Log In to access member features.
5. Start by browsing the collection or adding your first material.

If you already have an account, use Log In instead. The site also notes that if you enter an email address in search, it will ask whether you want to search for members instead of materials.

Getting Started After You Join

• Browse the Collection — use "Browse All Materials" or browse by discipline to see what is already available.
• Search — use the main search or Advanced Search, which supports searching by Materials or Members.
• Add a Material — contribute something you have found or created.
• Try Content Builder — if you want to create your own multi-page learning site, start with the video tutorial.

The community is built around participation, so the fastest way to get value from it is to browse first, then contribute.