[Open-education] OER Digest - October 20th, 2016

Thu Oct 20 22:24:54 UTC 2016

>From Brady Yano (SPARC) and | Volume 17 | October 20th, 2016

With help from Ethan Senack, Richard Saunders, and Nicole Allen

THE OER DIGEST

Your bi-weekly newsletter for open education updates, opportunities, and
reminders

FLORIDA VIRTUAL CAMPUS SURVEY: This week Florida Virtual Campus released
it’s third report
<https://dlss.flvc.org/documents/210036/361552/2016+Student+Textbook+Survey.pdf/fa58795e-f2d3-4fc7-9f07-a7e1b31fbbcd>
on
textbook costs
<https://dlss.flvc.org/documents/210036/361552/2016+Student+Textbook+Survey.pdf/fa58795e-f2d3-4fc7-9f07-a7e1b31fbbcd>
since 2010. The report investigates the impact textbook costs are having on
college affordability, student actions to address cost, as well as college
success and completion. This survey had more than 22,000 students from all
of Florida’s public colleges and universities voluntarily participate in
2016 alone. The report identified recommendations for how the state could
work toward building partnerships and a statewide infrastructure to support
the use of OER. From the report:

The findings suggest that the cost of textbooks is negatively impacting
student access to required materials (66.6% did not purchase the required
textbook) and learning (37.6% earn a poor grade; 19.8% fail a course). Time
to graduation and/or access is also impacted by cost. Students reported
that they occasionally or frequently take fewer courses (47.6%); do not
register for a course (45.5%); drop a course (26.1%), or withdraw from
courses (20.7%).

NEW US NATIONAL STUDENT DEBT FIGURES: A new report
<http://ticas.org/sites/default/files/u159/classof2015_embargoed.pdf> from
The Institute for College Access & Success (TICAS) reveals that students
from the class of 2015 who took out loans to pay for college graduated with
an average debt of $30,100. The figure, which is up 4 percent from the
previous year, captures the average debt of students who received a
bachelor's degree from either a public or private nonprofit college. Nearly
seven in 10 graduating seniors in 2015 used student loans to finance their
education. These numbers underscore the importance of efforts to reduce
college costs including OER.

#GOOPEN REGIONAL SUMMIT: On October 7th, the Vista Unified School District
in Vista, CA hosted a #GoOpen Regional Summit for K-12 administrators,
teachers, librarians, media techs, and the business community. “#GoOpen
Regional summits are intended for new districts who have recently committed
to become a #GoOpen Launch district or are curious about making a scalable
transition to openly licensed educational resources. Read more>>
<http://classroomofthefuture.org/vista-unified-school-district-goopen-regional-summit/>

PARTNERSHIP FOR ANCILLARY MATERIALS: OpenStax and OER Commons announced
they were partnering to provide online community hubs where instructors can
freely share and modify syllabuses, homework, study guides and other
open-copyright course materials that are made specifically for OpenStax
textbooks. Read more>>
<http://news.rice.edu/2016/10/11/openstax-oer-commons-partner-on-community-hubs-2/>

OPENSTAX GOES OUT OF THIS WORLD: OpenStax has also released its newest open
textbook, Astronomy <https://openstax.org/details/astronomy>. Designed to
meet the scope and sequence requirements of one- or two-semester
introductory astronomy courses, this is the first open textbook within the
discipline.

ONTARIO STUDENT LEADERS GO OPEN: This week, eCampus Ontario hosted a
Student Engagement Seminar, bringing together student leaders and staff
from the province’s five largest student organizations to learn about OER.
The event provided a rare opportunity for the various groups to meet with
one another and engage in conversations about strategic approaches to OER
advocacy and how OER can be used in learning. Brady Yano (SPARC) and Kelsey
Wiens (Creative Commons) were present to help guide conversation throughout
the day.

4th ANNIVERSARY: The B.C. Open Textbook Project marked its 4th anniversary,
having saved students an estimated $2.3 million. The project is the first
government-sponsored initiative of its kind in Canada. It is estimated that
more than 18,000 students in B.C. have benefitted from using open textbooks
since the project was first announced on Oct. 16, 2012. Read more>>
<https://news.gov.bc.ca/releases/2016AVED0099-002013>

SEE YOU AT #OPENED16: Our next OER Digest will be put together at the 13th
Annual Open Education Conference <http://openedconference.org/2016/>. With
one of the community’s capstone events just around the corner, we recommend
taking a minute to check out the awesome program. Looking forward to seeing
you there!

OPEN CONNECTIONS

Conferences, jobs, and other OER-related opportunities

EVENT: International Open Access Week is taking place next week, October
24-30. Events are happening around the world.
<https://www.openeducationweek.org/page/call-for-participation>
http://www.openaccessweek.org/

EVENT: The University of North Dakota is hosting the Open Education
Resources Summit 2016 on October 27.
http://und.edu/calendar/index.php/view/event/detail/44967/open-education-resources-summit-2016

EVENT: The 13th Annual OpenEd conference is next month, November 2-4.
http://openedconference.org/2016/

EVENT: RSVP <http://openedconference.org/2016/> now to attend OpenCon Live
<http://www.opencon2016.org/live>, the live webcast of OpenCon 2016 this
November 12-14. <http://openedconference.org/2016/>
http://www.opencon2016.org/opencon_2016_live

JOB: BCcampus is looking for one or more Freelance Writers for their news
blog. The start date is October 26, 2016.
https://bccampus.ca/rfp-for-freelance-writing/

OPPORTUNITY: Southern Utah University is beginning a peer-reviewed open
digital publication titled Case Studies in Open Educational Resources.
Submissions related to any field or level of education are invited. For
more information see attachment below or contact csoer at suu.edu

STORIES FROM THE FIELD

A brief snapshot of those making change on the ground level, and those most
impacted

FROM BRITISH COLUMBIA: “Students are just not purchasing their textbooks
because of the costs of them,” said Erin Fields, flexible learning
coordinator at the UBC Library. “If it’s a choice between being able to
live and to have food, or spending thousands of dollars on textbooks for
one term, the choice becomes really a simple one for a student to make.” Read
more>
<http://ubyssey.ca/news/open-educational-resources-could-alleviate-financial-burden-of-textbooks-for-students/>

FROM MISSOURI: “We think that everyone should have access to scholarly
information as cheaply as possible, ideally free.” MSA is currently in the
process of creating two surveys they hope to implement by the end of the
semester: one for the students, and one for faculty. By the end of the
year, MSA plans to recognize the professors at MU who use OERs. Their
long-term goal is to see the number of professors who use OERs rise to 15
percent in 10 years. Read more>
<http://www.themaneater.com/stories/2016/9/27/msa-hopes-encourage-use-open-educational-resources/>

TWEET OF THE WEEK

Giulia Forsythe ‏@giuliaforsythe <https://twitter.com/giuliaforsythe>:
Advancing #OER <https://twitter.com/hashtag/OER?src=hash> in Ontario,
#ecampusontario <https://twitter.com/hashtag/ecampusontario?src=hash>
 Student Leadership prez by @bradyyano <https://twitter.com/bradyyano>
 #textbookbrokeBC <https://twitter.com/hashtag/textbookbrokeBC?src=hash>
http://bit.ly/2drcImi

SYLLABUS

Interesting Reads on Education and Open

Pearson faces a textbook lesson in how markets wane | The Telegraph

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2016/10/17/pearson-faces-a-textbook-lesson-in-how-markets-wane/

A possible solution to one college cost problem: free books | The Hechinger
Report

http://hechingerreport.org/a-possible-solution-to-one-college-cost-problem-free-books/

In this case publishers should root for the OER guys | BookBusiness

http://www.bookbusinessmag.com/post/case-publishers-root-oer-providers/

5 ways to participate in the #GoOpen movement | Getting Smart

http://gettingsmart.com/2016/10/5-ways-to-participate-in-goopen/

OER in K-12 Education - What does the research tell us? | CCSSO

http://www.ccsso.org/Resources/Programs/OER_Home_/OER_Blog_-_October_2016.html

Have suggestions for the next edition?

Let us know at oerdigest at gmail.com, or tweet us @OERdigest
<https://twitter.com/oerdigest>.

You can subscribe to the OER Digest here
<https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdsVwP-hgmvxYey_D1QbsKGAitjHhobvW6cX1vHGxSVWuq_sA/viewform>
.

 CSOER guidelines.pdf
<https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B4i0I-YnC5ebZ3d1R0xOaDRBUzRyTUVyTVJGMzA2U2VTdkZR/view?usp=drive_web>

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