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BC Open Textbooks is an initiative started by the province of British Columbia in Canada. It is open textbooks adapted and created by BC faculty. It's difficult to tell which texts are complete and ready for use as Tony Bates incomplete text that I created another post about appears on the same page with complete texts (eg Chemistry, Biology Geography.) All the texts can be modified through Creative Commons licensing. This project has been creating concern for publishers who stand to loose business in BC and other provinces if the texts get adopted outside of BC. Initially, the project was focused on creating "a collection of open textbooks aligned with the top 40 highest-enrolled subject areas in the province. A second phase was announced in the spring of 2014 to add 20 textbooks targeting trades and skills training." Initially they looked for existing Creative Commons books they could adapt and they adapted 8 textbooks. From inception to fall 2014, 2244 students have used their open texts for a savings of $353,000 or $157 per student. The aim is to reach 200,000 students annually so they are at .6% and save each $900-$1500/year, still quite a way to go. Wondering how much this project is costing taxpayers, I googled and found this article http://www.ousa.ca/2013/04/24/textbooks/ which claims $600k-$1m/year. So the government has spent $1.2 - $2 million to save students $350k over the past two years. Still a long way to go to break even. In summary, 65 texts published, 45 adoptions, 2244 student users, for a savings of $353k to date. If this was a traditional textbook publishing company, they'd soon be out of business if they weren't already.

Thank for sharing, I believe that the conclusions that this article leaves us are not surprising, although yes very interesting. "Recently, the Babson Survey Research Group and Pearson conducted a survey of nearly 8,000 faculty members in higher education to find out more about how faculty are using social media. While we often post infographics showing trends or results from specific studies here at Edudemic, I found the results of this survey particularly interesting - perhaps because they were so different from what I expected." Julia Echeverria

You are so, so lucky. Here in South Africa, we are regressing, not even looking at online textbooks, but trying to reduce textbooks to only one per subject. The textbook crisis: http://mg.co.za/article/2013-08-23-00-south-africas-hidden-textbook-crisis and the regressive "solution" http://mg.co.za/article/2014-10-10-single-textbook-option-slammed. It is very frustrating for me, knowing all the possibilities, but not having any agency to get through to the authorities here.Llibraries are also failing horribly in advocating for the solutions that ARE available.

"What solutions might we find within our community to solve the problem of rising textbook prices? In our latest issue brief, Nancy Maron, Ithaka S+R's Program Director for Sustainability and Scholarly Communications, looks at recent trends in textbook publishing and suggests that collaborations between university presses and academic libraries might yield a new breed of textbook more aligned to the needs of faculty and students."

Relevant article on the cost of textbooks and the rise of open education Before entering the classroom of an intro-level economics course, students get a real-life experience with the subject - the required textbook costs $290 on Amazon. And that's just one book for one class. Textbook costs have surged 1,500 percent since 1970, according to the Economist magazine.

Community Colleges for Open Education Resources I chose this resource since I work at a community college and The mission is expanding access to education by promoting awareness and adoption of Open Educational Resources (OER). Over 250 colleges have joined the consortium and many more participate in our activities and use resources posted here. The Community College Consortium for Open Educational Resources (CCCOER)is a joint effort by individual community colleges, regional and statewide consortia, the Open Courseware Consortium, the American Association for Community Colleges, the League for Innovation in the Community Colleges, and many other educational partners to develop and use open educational resources, open textbooks, and open courseware to expand access to higher education and improve teaching and learning.

Open education information and group resources

Open education information and group resources

A source of some open text books with a interesting back story that should act as a warning about open--they are all now ex-open text books. After 2012 the publisher decided to abandon the CC/open textbook model and shifted the licensing on all their books. However, you can not revoke a CC license retroactively, so copies of the books downloaded prior to the change are still CC. But if the publisher no longer provides access to them, they disappear from CC circulation and access--luckily in this case, some one saved the CC versions and makes them available on this website. thanks!

Seriously useful! Indeed!

Wow, this collection is extensive, and the content seems good too! I'm so glad that someone was motivated enough to make these available according to their original licenses -- but it feels a bit bittersweet as well they had to resort to guerilla tactics to keep them available. It does make me wonder -- why did the publishing company decide to start charging for their textbooks? Was the previous model unprofitable?

The open educational resources model, including textbooks, has emerged as a response to rising text prices, a need for greater access to high-quality learning materials, the proliferation of e-reader devices, and a trend in publishing toward electronic media. Many contend that educational resources should be open and that instructional models increasingly depend on open content.

College textbooks cost too much - and something needs to be done about it, according to a report from the advocacy group U.S. PIRG. The College Board estimates that the average student in this country spends around $1,200 a year on books and supplies. A single book can cost as much as $200. This is why we need open textbooks!

More on open textbook 

This is an open textbook that Tony Bates is writing as part of the BC Open Textbook initiative. The topic is Teaching in the Digital Age. It's interesting as it's a work in progress and Tony has been blogging parts of the book to gain feedback as he is writing it. It's a topic that I am interested in. I do think it could use a substantial amount of copy editing, which it may yet receive, as may inconsistencies jump out at me in the TOC alone. I will be continuing to monitor this one as it develops further into his finished book.

Open Textbook development in BC, Canada.

This library is a tool to help instructors find affordable, quality textbook solutions. All textbooks in this library are complete and openly licensed. I found the site difficult to search. The available books are not useful for the courses that I teach but the site is probably useful for numerous courses and educational levels.

This project, while still in early development, will help those interested in historical (read: ancient) languages learn them outside of the traditional instructional method. Students will gain proficiency in languages through engaging with real materials rather than inaccessible textbooks and through relevant tasks that engage them more deeply in the learning process. It's also part of a larger ongoing project called the Open Philology Project which reflects the growing trend towards more experiential and open models of student learning in the study of ancient languages.

The year I graduated high school, the media was overrun with speculation about a new technology set to shake the foundation of the world. What was it? We weren't told, exactly. All we knew was that code name "IT" was so revolutionary that we would have to rebuild our cities from scratch.

It is interesting that whenever a new innovation is introduced, the current one is declared dead before its final time arrives. Books in whatever format are appealing to different audiences for various reasons. To think that the introduction of e-books was going to lead to a declaration of war on printed books is laughable. Books will be with us for as long as we are still in this world. Does format matter? only time will tell.

Long back Lancaster wrote about paperless society but still we are heavily depending on paper only. Technology has fast evolved. First we talked about e-libraries then virtual libraries and now contemplating cloud based libraries. Many technologies have come and gone but paper is still ubiquitous.

Well, a Link to another Diigo List... Online UCF's List: Open Source Digital Content - This section is a collection of open online learning materials, categorized by disciplines. It covers resources such as Merlot, MIT Open Courseware, open textbooks,, Google Scholar, and more.

Why it "works" Network Effect Wikipedia benefits tremendously from the network effect. The network effect is when a user of a product benefits more from a product if other people also use the product. Telephones are a textbook example. If only a few dozen consumers have telephones, then the telephones aren't very useful. But if millions of consumers have telephones, they become more useful since each telephone owner can contact many people. The large number of Wikipedia users benefits Wikipedia. First, the more editors there are, the the higher the accuracy and quality of the articles. Secondly, it gives an incentive to users to edit. Since editors know the each article will be read by thousands of users, the sheer influence of each article is a strong enough incentive to edit, even though Wikipedia is free. Openness Wikipedia is free and open for any user to edit, even anonymously. This means there is a very large number of editors. This helps Wikipedia ensure accuracy since each mistake and inaccuracy will have to get by hundreds of editors. With so many writers, the scope of Wikipedia articles is very large, minimizing the amount of missing information. Although the openness of Wikipedia provides a powerful self-correcting method, it also makes Wikipedia vulnerable to vandalism. In addition, editors are anonymous and may have a conflict of interest, or might have inadequate knowledge of the article's subject. Yet, because Wikipedia is open to any edits, it is also likely to be corrected. It operates by a system of checks and balances from many editors. However, it has some guidelines to protect it against misinformation and bias: 1. Verifiability principle. To prevent bias and to protect the encyclopedic quality of its articles, all edits on Wikipedia must in theory be a verifiable fact. Moreover, it must have a reliable source to verify each fact. 2. No Original Research. As an encyclopedia, it is mean to be a secondary source of infor

This blog post gives a short but important overview about what is a MOOC. The author also gives an insight into the MOOC design model showing what to consider when planning a MOOC. What is even more interesting is the fact, that this post is just a chapter of an open textbook "Teaching in in Digital Age".

I really cannot recommend this resource highly enough. The brainchild and master's thesis of a lawyer-turned-information professional, SIPX is an incredible blend of copyright control centre, digital distribution hub, and online marketplace. With the impending downfall of Access Copyright and its rejection by most Canadian universities, schools have had to quickly learn about copyright and establish good practices and guidelines, but this product provides the safest legal protection while considerably upgrading the dissemination of course readings; it also makes strides that push against the dominance of the traditional textbook market. It has already been adopted by several major American universities, including Stanford (where it was developed; it seems all the greatest open knowledge stuff is coming out of there!) and Notre Dame. Did I mention that it even supports MOOCs? I just found out about this resource while doing a practicum placement for library school, and I can't believe that I'd never heard of it before. It's exactly the kind of integrated library and informational system that needs to happen in academic institutions, and while it's not explicitly modelled on open access, it relies on many of the same values that we've talked about throughout this course. Check it out!

The different approach needed to market traditional educational resources and OER

Thank you for sharing. The article highlight a real-life problem. I am sure in my country many faculty members and librarians of higher educational establishment are not aware of OER and therefore they prefer safe and sure textbooks. Librarians should be first to explore, understand and market this type of resources. At the same time time may be needed in order to change educational policy and choice of textbooks.

What is open textbook publishing