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Open Access Textbooks

Access, Scholarship and Community

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Open Access Textbooks

• Textbooks (and related materials) which are open — that is free for anyone to use, reuse and redistribute.

• Changes model for students– Learning/teaching options :: Almost always digital– Low/No Cost :: Creative Commons (CC) license

• Flexible – Faculty and students own content – Remix content to meet specific needs

• Online/hybrid learning communities • Personal learning environments

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Students & Traditional Textbooks

• Students on average spend $900 on textbooks annually

• College textbook prices have risen at twice the inflation rate since the 1980s, averaging 6% per year.

• New editions with minimal alterations are coming out at a faster rate compared to cycles 10 to 20 years ago.

• Customized publishing designed for specific classes raises prices and negates student ability to buy and sell used books.

Government Accountability Office. College Textbooks: appear to drive the recent price increases. Washington D. C.: United States Government Accountability Office, July, 2005

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Similar, But Different

• eBooks– Different cost & distribution models

• Generally one user at a time/not multi-user licensed, same costs as traditional book, faculty & students can’t change content to meet course/student needs

• Course Reserves– Not Creative Commons licensed– “Closed” access to material

• Reserves & eBooks support some digital learning environments but do not completely address traditional textbook issues

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Creative Commons

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Open Textbook Example I

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Open Textbook Example II

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Open Textbook Example III

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Quality of Open Textbooks

• Materials are not anonymous (e.g. Wikipedia)• Pedagogy and Tradition

– Faculty decide if an item meets their quality standards– Communities of scholars collaborate

In order to help users find the materials they need, we are developing a system that enables anyone (individuals, institutions, professional societies, and so on) to set up their own review process that sifts through the entire repository and directs users to the content judged to be "high quality". It is basically analogous to the "peer review" systems used in academic journals, but more scalable. - Connexions, The Open Textbook portal at Rice University

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Provost Council Reactions & Next Steps

• Do you know of faculty who are already using open textbooks?

• Do you think there might be support in your colleges?– Use Open Textbooks

– Create (author) Open Textbooks

• What’s missing from this overview?• If there is support, where might we go from here?

– Are there existing groups/committees who could take this issue (Council of Associate Deans?)

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Resources

• Notes and Further Reading– CCCOER (De Anza)

• Community College Consortium for Open Educational Resources

– Connexions (Rice)

– Educause Review

– William and Flora Hewlett Foundation (Open Educational Resources)

– University of California

http://delicious.com/shawncalhoun/open_textbook