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Open Source Text-Books in California?
ebusinessmedia1 asks: "The California Open Source Textbook Project (COSTP) was created a few years ago in an attempt to help California's educational bureaucracy understand the value of open-sourced, K-12 textbook development, and we are an official collaborator with Creative Commons. COSTP could, within 6-8 years, save California up to $400M+ per year in K-12 textbook costs. (in addition to 100's-of-millions more saved in other states).
We're looking for further ideas on how we might push this forward, promote it through something like the Connexions Project http://cnx.rice.edu/ at Rice University, work with enlightened for-profits on an open-source K-12 textbook model, get a test piloted, or somehow get the project bumped up a notch, funded, etc. Ideas anyone?"
"Our project has been lobbied/promoted to every level of government and education in California, from the Governor's office, and the legislature, on down. I hear 'this is a great idea' from many people in government, but not a single government agency or legislator (who agree the project has legs) - not even the California Teacher's Assn. - wants to promote it as an initiative in the legislature.
Nobody wants to upset the status quo, where commercial publishers - in a virtual oligopoly - create costly textbook products that have risen at three times the rate of inflation since 1992. It's not unusual for K-12 books to cost 2-3 times what books with similar content would cost in a trade (regular) bookstore."
Take a look at Everything2 or Wikipedia for examples of what is wrong with open source reference materials.
Basically, the only information that gets entered is entered by interested parties. Therefore a topic like the Open Source movement get tons of information (both good and bad) and other things like photosynthesis get very little written about it.
In reference to the point that texts are rising at 3x the rate of inflation, does that take into account the increase in expenses of the publisher? There are many people involved in making a text, from the author to editors to the unions that run the mills and presses. Just because the price of something is rising faster than inflation does not automatically suggest that there is a problem. It could also suggest an improvement in the quality of the final product.
Perhaps, but I can give you a good example. I've yet to hear of a Grade School US History class that mentions that most of the people in the colonies during the revolutionary war were loyalists.
They neglect to mention George Washington was a slave owner.
That prior to entering politics, in his time as a lawyer, Abraham Lincoin was counsel in alot of cases relating to slavery and run away slaves... yet he never defended a slave.
They don't even mention that the 16th amendment could not be ratified without the southern states, but was put into effect anyway. They don't mention the drastic changes in citizenship that came with it. It wasn't until this point that people were U.S. Citizens instead of citizens of their respective states. They also strongly imply the civil war was over slavery even though historical evidence does not indicate this...
The publishing industry is deeply rooted in the corrupt educational beuracracy and is gaining ground, if anything.
You'll notice in college classes today that large freshman English and Literature classes use something called the "Mercury Reader" which is a customized collection of stories that costs about $40. The publishers encourage instructors to swap out stories every year. (Killing the used book market)
I taught a English 101 class a couple of years ago and was forced to use it. My students went and spent $40 for works that are in the public domain! They could have easily purchased four or five Dover Thrift Editions for $8-10, or bought used books for less.
Conformity is the jailer of freedom and enemy of growth. -JFK