Category: News

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University System of Maryland Explores OER

“Holding a whiteboard, the University of Maryland, College Park students scrawled their complaints and posed for a picture.

“My name is Justin and I spent $114 on ONE textbook,” a student wrote. “My name is Jeff and I spent $736 on textbooks,” wrote another.

The images, posted online by the Student Government Association in recent months, are designed to highlight the rapid rise in the price of college textbooks over the past decade. This semester, the University System of Maryland is exploring ways to bring that cost to zero with “open-source” electronic textbooks — the latest experiment in changing the way students in Maryland and across the nation are taught.”

New strategy would drop college textbook costs to zero, Baltimore Sun, March 22, 2014.

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Open Books, Not Open Wallets: How OER Helps Students Spend Less and Learn More

The Open Books, Not Open Wallets: How OER Helps Students Spend Less and Learn More panel was great. In case you missed it, here are some of the materials shared:

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Opening the Textbook

Cover of Opening the Textbook

Thanks to Jill Cirasella for pointing out this Ithaka briefing paper on the role of libraries in open education resources.

There’s a lot of great stuff in the paper, including this interesting musing:

What if…collaboration among university presses, university libraries, campus-based instructional design groups, and faculty could produce the best of class textbooks? The presses have needed expertise in developing collections, editing manuscripts, and managing distribution channels; libraries have a strong position on campus to support faculty and students and could identify useful materials, whether created on campus or
elsewhere.