[Open-education] OER Digest - December 6, 2019

Fri Dec 6 20:19:18 UTC 2019

VOLUME 95

>From  Bilan Jama (CCUSA) | Volume 95 | December 6th, 2019

THE OER DIGEST

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

UNESCO UPDATE: It’s official! UNESCO’s General Conference adopted a
recommendation
<https://marketbrief.edweek.org/marketplace-k-12/open-education-resources-get-international-backing-unesco-vote/>
on OER. The recommendation (which underwent a few last minute changes) will
support the development and sharing of openly licensed learning and
teaching materials, which benefits students, teachers and researchers
worldwide. UNESCO’s assistant director for communication and information,
Moez Chakchouk announced the launch of a Dynamic Coalition to expand and
consolidate commitments and strategies in the area of OER.

OPEN AUTHOR: OER Commons launched a new authoring tool called Open Author
<https://www.oercommons.org/authoring-overview>. Open Author helps build
and publish Open Educational Resources for the benefit of educators and
learners everywhere. It can be used to create resources with both
instructor and student facing views, which means that instructors can view
the resource that is customized for instruction, and students can view the
resource that is customized for their learning needs. OER Commons is asking
for feedback from users
<https://twitter.com/OERCommons/status/1199393618240229376> for the next
few weeks.

LGBTQ-INCLUSIVE OER: Sabia Prescott, a senior program associate for the New
America Foundation has released a new report
<https://www.newamerica.org/education-policy/reports/supporting-lgbtq-inclusive-teaching/>
examining the possibilities inherent in LGBTQ-inclusive materials
<http://blogs.edweek.org/edweek/DigitalEducation/2019/11/digital-open-educational-resources-LGTBQ.html>
for training classroom teachers. She explores the biggest challenges to
creating, implementing, and scaling up this kind of PreK–12 teacher
professional learning. "A lot of schools are using ten, fifteen,
twenty-year old textbooks...and for talking about queer and trans
identities, our understanding of these identities evolves. And our language
for understanding these identities evolves," said Prescott.

MERGER OPPOSITION GROWS: This week, the National Association of College
Stores became the latest major organization to oppose the proposed merger
between textbook publishing giants Cengage and McGraw-Hill. NACS, which
represents college bookstores, announced its opposition
<https://www.insidehighered.com/digital-learning/article/2019/12/04/college-bookstores-group-opposes-cengage-mcgraw-merger>
in a letter to Cengage in response to a change in the company’s pricing
practices on access codes.

OPEN CONNECTIONS

Conferences, jobs, and other OER-related opportunities

#OPENED20: An open letter
<https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ne5LY9q4iH4MxfzxP5VjaDFmy6acxYyfAvnbzcuKIV4/edit>
was circulated to the community calling for those interested in helping to
organize an Open Education Conference in 2020 to step forward by
completing this
form
<https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdmKWXdM3r4XQIt5hEOURZMdRnzSZ_Xn1ti1gllAAnEk6t5Pw/viewform>
.

HIRING NOW: Texas Department of Motor Vehicles is hiring an Open Education
Resources Curriculum Lead. Click here
<https://austin.jobing.com/texas-department-of-motor-vehicles/open-education-resources-curriculum-lead-program-specialist-vi?utm_campaign=google_jobs_apply&utm_source=google_jobs_apply&utm_medium=organic>
to read more about the position and apply.

JOB OPENING: Paradise Valley Community College is hiring an Academic
Engagement and Open Education Librarian. Check out the job description and
apply here <http://www.maricopa.edu/about/careers> by this Friday, December
6, 2019 to be considered.

SAVE THE DATE: The next Open Education Southern Symposium will be held July
16 – 17, 2020 on the North Carolina State University campus in Raleigh.
Learn more and check in for further updates here
<https://openedss.uark.edu/>.

STORIES FROM THE FIELD

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

FROM TEXAS: The Department of Mathematics and Statistics at Sam Houston
State University has promoted the usage of OER for more than a decade.
Individual efforts by professors have developed into a new departmental
initiative in 2019. The department has adopted the textbook “Math in
Society” by David Lippman as the standard textbook used for the popular
college mathematics course, Math 1332. All 17 sections of Math 1332 in fall
2019 have utilized this free book, replacing the textbook formerly adopted
for the course that cost students close to $120 per copy. This saved the
888 students registered for the course a total of approximately $106,000
this semester. Read More >
<https://www.woodlandsonline.com/npps/story.cfm?nppage=64843>

FROM CALIFORNIA: Through the Pierce Open Pathways (POP) program offered at
Pierce College, students have saved more than $2 million in textbook costs
since 2015. Students in the POP program can earn an entire university
transfer degree without ever paying for a traditional textbook. According
to Pierce College at JBLM Executive Director Mark Haskins, “This program is
a powerful example of what we try to do to reduce barriers for our
military-affiliated students. While military tuition assistance (TA)
provides an excellent educational benefit for service members, it cannot be
used to pay for textbooks, which can be a significant expense. Students in
our OER classes have little to no out-of-pocket costs, further making us
one of the most accessible schools and best values in education for the
military.” Read More >
<https://thesubtimes.com/2019/11/24/pierce-college-program-saves-students-2-million-in-textbook-costs>

FROM BRITISH COLUMBIA:  The Bachelor of Arts Degree in General Studies
program at KPU is the first four-year program to introduce the new ZTC
framework, due to its use of open educational resources. KPU’s Zero
Textbook Cost programs now include an entire arts degree in which students
won’t have to pay anything for their textbooks. The degree accreditation is
based on the completion of 120 credits of coursework, or approximately 40
courses, completely free of textbook costs. Read More >
<https://runnermag.ca/2019/11/kpus-general-studies-degree-is-now-completely-textbook-cost-free/>

HOT OFF THE PRESS

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

Anna A. Berardi and Brenda M. Morton released “Trauma-Informed School
Practices <https://traumainformedschoolpractices.pressbooks.com/>.” The
book’s primary focus
<https://open.umn.edu/opentextbooks/textbooks/trauma-informed-school-practices-building-expertise-to-transform-schools>
is on identifying and applying trauma-informed educator competencies needed
to transform districts, schools, educators, classrooms, and the field of
education itself, while also including community members such as parents
and board members in these processes.

WEIGH IN

Great reads to repost or share and interesting discussions to consider

Great to Share >>

When digitizing your curriculum, think coordination
<https://edscoop.com/when-digitizing-your-curriculum-think-coordination/> |
EdScoop

What Can We Learn from the Open Education Movement About Attaining
Educational SDG in the Digital Age? <http://infojustice.org/archives/41831>
| InfoJustice.org

A look into some resources that have helped save students money on textbooks
<http://ndsuspectrum.com/textbook-savings/> | The Spectrum

Interesting to Consider >>

Librarians leading for free textbooks
<https://cwuobserver.com/14138/news/librarians-leading-for-free-textbooks/>
| The Observer

Sac State considering textbook program for immediate course material access
<https://statehornet.com/2019/11/sac-state-considering-textbook-program-for-immediate-course-material-access/>
| The State Hornet

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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