[Open-education] OER Digest - April 5th, 2018

Thu Apr 5 19:50:16 UTC 2018

>From Ethan Senack, Creative Commons USA | Volume 54 | April 5th, 2018

THE OER DIGEST

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

STATE UPDATES: Legislation <https://leg.colorado.gov/bills/hb18-1331> to
create a Colorado OER Council within the state’s department of higher
education has been introduced, and passed in the House there. The Council
is written to include “persons appointed by the executive director of the
department from public institutions of higher education, including a
student; the executive director of the department; the commissioner of
education; and the state librarian.” In Virginia, both chambers have passed a
bill <https://lis.virginia.gov/cgi-bin/legp604.exe?181+sum+HB454> requiring
higher education institutions “to implement guidelines for the adoption and
use of low-cost and no-cost open educational resources,” which now heads to
the Governor for signing.

MICROSOFT LOOKS TO OPEN: Microsoft announced
<https://marketbrief.edweek.org/marketplace-k-12/big-open-educational-resources-provider-joins-forces-microsoft/>
that they’re modifying their educational content app OneNote to incorporate
open curricula from Open Up Resources <http://openupresources.org/>,
meaning the highly-reviewed Math and English Language content will reach a
broad new audience. It’s expected that all of the content will be freely
accessible, editable, and downloadable through the platform. Microsoft is
the latest of a number of companies testing the waters with OER.

MORE APPROPRIATIONS COVERAGE: The FY18 Omnibus appropriations bill has been
signed in to law, making the $5 million federal OER grant program official.
Check out some of the follow-up coverage on the campaign to make it a
reality and how things look moving forward:

   - Salon:
   <https://www.salon.com/2018/04/01/new-federal-program-tackles-spiraling-costs-of-college-textbooks_partner/>
   New federal program tackles spiraling costs of college textbooks
   - EdScoop:
   <https://edscoop.com/oer-college-textbooks-education-department-pilot-program>
   OER for higher ed gets a boost with $5 million pilot program
   - Inside Higher Ed:
   <https://www.insidehighered.com/digital-learning/article/2018/03/28/oer-gains-momentum-federal-push-2018-budget>
   Feds Come Around to OER -- Slowly
   - E-Learning Inside:
   <https://news.elearninginside.com/open-educational-resources-could-finally-be-on-the-horizon/>
   Open Educational Resources Could Finally Be On the Horizon

OPENSTAX CALL: Open textbook publisher OpenStax announced
<https://openstax.org/institutional-partnership> that they’re seeking a new
cohort of Institutional Partners - apply by April 24th.

SPOTLIGHT: College of Canyons in California scored prime coverage of their
OER work, including a widely-shared feature in EdSurge
<https://www.edsurge.com/news/2018-03-28-how-an-oer-rookie-dove-deep-into-a-zero-cost-textbook-degree-program>
titled “How an OER Rookie Dove Deep Into a Zero-Cost Textbook Degree
Program.” They’re also piloting
<https://signalscv.com/2018/04/coc-accepting-applications-2018-19-first-year-promise-program/>
a tuition-free grant program for qualified students - which will use OER to
help tackle textbook costs as well. University of North Georgia’s OER work
was highlighted
<http://ungvanguard.org/2018/03/some-ung-professors-are-implementing-free-online-textbooks/>
this past week, as were students advocating
<http://www.dailytoreador.com/news/library-student-government-hoping-for-solution-to-expensive-book-prices/article_490647b8-36d1-11e8-a857-9325559e8187.html>
for OER at Texas Tech.

OPEN CONFERENCES

Upcoming Events, Proposal and Registration Deadlines, Report-Backs

CALL FOR PROPOSALS: The deadline for session proposals at the OpenEd
conference in October is tomorrow, April 6th. Submit here:
https://openedconference.org/2018/call-for-proposals/

CALL FOR PROPOSALS: The deadline for proposals at the Northeast Regional
OER Summit
<https://www.library.umass.edu/services/teaching-and-learning/oer/northeast-oer-summit>
are due on Wednesday, April 11th. Submit here:
http://www.ctdlc.org/Conference/proposals.cfm

STORIES FROM THE FIELD

Quick snapshots of those making change on the ground level, and those
impacted

FROM TEXAS (HIGHER ED): “Some other campuses have done other similar
surveys, but we really wanted to get an idea of what Texas Tech students
thought about open textbooks and what they would use them for,” Camille
Thomas, scholarly publishing librarian, said. “We wanted to find out what
students felt comfortable paying, what kind of choices they were making
with the classes they were enrolling with and how well they were doing in
their class or if they were deciding not to buy the book because of the
cost and things like that.” Read More >
<http://www.dailytoreador.com/news/library-student-government-hoping-for-solution-to-expensive-book-prices/article_490647b8-36d1-11e8-a857-9325559e8187.html>

FROM IOWA (K-12): “One of the biggest issues we’ve had is having common
understanding. We have a lot of people saying ‘oh, we love OER’ and then
when you ask them to describe OER, they’re going to have a different
definition than the person sitting next to them.” Hear More >
<https://iskme.zoom.us/recording/play/IetVdDFXIORET30vsE5vyl9mqDPVWKOfqua0cxD7fnYNsDZo8hVpcMhABMo-2OHb>

HOT OFF THE PRESS

Each edition, we’ll highlight an interesting, new, openly-licensed resource

OER champs Robin DeRosa and Rajiv Jhangiani launched openpedagogy.org,
designed to be a space for educators, staff, and students to “browse
diverse examples of open pedagogy in practice as well as share their own
practices & ideas.” They welcome constructive feedback and new examples.

WEIGH IN

Interesting Discussions and Strategic Reads to Repost or Share

Great to Share >>

How OpenStax books are made | OpenStax

https://openstax.org/blog/news/how-openstax-books-are-made

Interesting to Consider >>

Signing Students up for Surveillance: Textbook Publisher Terms of Use for
Data | Medium

https://medium.com/@billymeinke/signing-students-up-for-surveillance-textbook-publisher-terms-of-use-for-data-24514fb7dbe4

Schools Shift to Free, Public-Domain Curricula | Wall Street Journal

https://www.wsj.com/articles/schools-shift-to-free-public-domain-textbooks-1490897412

Signing Students up for Surveillance: Textbook Publisher Terms of Use for
Data | Medium

https://medium.com/@billymeinke/signing-students-up-for-surveillance-textbook-publisher-terms-of-use-for-data-24514fb7dbe4

OER and Obstacles to Adoption | Inside Higher Ed

https://www.insidehighered.com/blogs/confessions-community-college-dean/oer-and-obstacles-adoption

Have suggestions for the next edition? Let us know at oerdigest at gmail.com,
or tweet us @OERdigest <https://twitter.com/oerdigest>.

The OER Digest is a public newsletter distributed to a broad group of
stakeholders across the higher education community. You can join the open
Google Group or check out the distribution list here
<https://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/oerdigest>.
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