Maryland Awards 21 Grants To Prepare 'Open Source' Textbooks (usmd.edu)

"The University System of Maryland has awarded 21 "mini grants" to university faculty to "help them expand open education resources," reports OpenSource.com. Recipients of the grants are also given time off to prepare courses that use open textbooks, and will receive personalized support and training on effective course design. An anonymous reader writes: "Although our faculty view textbooks as essential, some of our students see them as a luxury they cannot afford," said Community College of Baltimore County President Sandra Kurtinitis. "Having access to open educational resources will provide some financial relief for our students as well as contribute to their academic success." The cost of textbooks has risen 812% since 1978, the school system said in an announcement, "outpacing even the cost of medical services and new housing. Nationally, students spend an average of $1,200 a year on textbooks."

The Maryland Open Source Textbook initiative started in 2013 "to provide a state-wide opportunity for faculty to explore the promise of open education resources to reduce students' cost of attendance while maintaining, or perhaps even improving, learning outcomes." Since then it's helped replace traditional textbooks in over 60 different courses at 14 public institutions across the state, resulting in a cumulative cost savings of over $1 million for 3,500 students. "In addition to saving students money, faculty have gained the ability to adapt and customize their instructional materials to ensure they are aligned with their pedagogical methods to best meet their students' needs," the school system reports. "In follow up surveys with students participating in the MOST initiative, 93% reported that the open educational resource content they used was the same or better quality than traditional textbooks."

Comments

YES!

[Insanity Defense]

This is an idea I've been in favor of for years. Thumbs up!

Maybe they should just reduce their fees

[Anonymous Coward]

Textbooks probably wouldn't be viewed as a luxury if the U.S universities and colleges didn't work out how the absolute maximum they could squeeze out of students and their families in tuition and fees and then charge them that.

Somebody hasn't been paying their bribes

[rsilvergun]

in Maryland. Seriously textbook industry F-. See me after class.

Link to actual article

[Anonymous Coward]

Here's the actual article in the diamondback - TFS links to a news aggregator that links to this:

http://www.dbknews.com/2017/04...

I was benefitted from a similar initiative.

[gwolf]

I published in 2015 a textbook about operating systems (http://sistop.org/). Besides working for a university full time, I got a grant from the LATIn Initiative from the European commission. They required me to join other authors (a requisite for participation was having at least threee coauthors, located in three different countries in Latin America), and paid each of us a very decent amount (€1200, particularly good given the wages in our region). There was, of course, a quality requirement - But the second requirement was for the licensing to be CC-BY.
I won on all fronts due to this.

Re:I was benefitted from a similar initiative.

[El Cubano]

I published in 2015 a textbook about operating systems (http://sistop.org/).

Thanks! I had a look and began reading it last night (when I should have been sleeping). The book is very well written, thorough, and also accessible to students who are still in the early stages of learning about the field.

I am in the process of redesigning a course which I teach on Java and business IT systems and this has inspired me to seek out new materials from the open textbook ecosystem. The current book I use is now quite outdated (the students complain about it and I don't like it) and the new edition removes many of the topics I teach in the course.

This has definitely been a big step in the right direction for me.

Re:capitalist exploitation

[John Jorsett]

The capitalist class are exploiting open source more than ever. Capitalists can't resist the promise of free labor, and the best part is the capitalists don't have to employ any of the young naive laborers. Open source means the work is publicly available and ripe for the taking. Capitalists just take everything and give nothing in return. Open source developers don't get paid anything, and developers live in poverty while capitalists make billions.

Explain how the "capitalist class" is going to make undeserved money from a resource made freely available at no cost to all. Sure, Red Hat et al earn money from Linux, but it's for the value-added they furnish. If you don't want to give them money, you can still download the product without paying, you'll just have to be your own support.

Cheap 1st/2nd year textbooks, expensive years 3+

[StandardCell]

I think this is generally a fantastic idea. Nothing has really changed in subjects such as calculus, linear algebra, chemistry and biology in decades if not centuries for some subjects. Heck, I used my dad's control systems textbook from the 60s to learn. My fear is that publishers will start charging people on the back end of this for more specialized textbooks that are more typical in third and fourth year courses or specialized graduate courses. So, free textbooks for the two-year community college crowd, but $500 textbooks for process control of chemical reactors and digital signal processing.

The real underlying problem here is that student loans are the only type of debt that can't be discharged under bankruptcy, and that has created a moral hazard for post-secondary institutions to accelerate their costs. Tuition has also greatly and disproportionately increased in cost because students can get mortgage-like terms for their student debt, but institutions don't have any responsibility to make sure they graduate or make money. Meanwhile, endowments, perks and expensive buildings keep going up on campuses with little marginal benefit to students. The cherry on top is the IMO bizarre cultural support in this country for post-secondary institutions from alumni and through college sports.

If you really want to solve the textbook crisis, solve the debt crisis in education and allow discharge of student debt in bankruptcy at the same time as you investigate the publishers for any type of RICO or antitrust activity. The system will take a few years to clean out, but the issue will eventually be solved. The best part will be that tuitions will eventually come down to sane levels again, although that will be at the expense of the administrators and faculty who are more concerned about pretty buildings and social justice than they are about academic and human progress.

Re: Buyer's collective for existing textbooks

[Anonymous Coward]

Places of higher learning (including community colleges) should just band together nationally or state level and go after all the primary subjects ...

They are doing exactly that. I give you the Open Education Consortium.

But there are lots of others. The University of Minnesota runs the Open Textbook Network.
Of course Openstax is producing lots of curriculum.

There are so many free textbook programs out there that the real challenge is paring down the list. Openstax seems to be emerging as the big, reliable repository.

My news site, for lack of a better word, about free textbooks.

Re:capitalist exploitation

[Geodesy99]

You seriously do not understand the ecosystem. Many of the major projects have core teams which are FTEs of the company, and others donate funds for outside contractors that are key contributors. Far from being paid nothing, I've known several that began as unpaid contributors and eventually went direct, started their own companies to service their piece, or received federal grants ( from the US Army for instance ). Other projects start on a purely unpaid volunteer effort, become essential and evolve into well funded projects. Firefox was originally a commercial product, then donated as open source, and now has spun off some of it's projects. IBM, Google, and others have transferred many internal projects into the open domain. Far from exploitation, FOSS is almost hyper-capitalistic, in that it short circuits the rent taking inherent in closed source monopolies, it allows microscopic participants into markets alongside the giants.

Here's a table of historical college costs

[Beeftopia]

To get a real feel for the sudden growth since 2000, note that the first two data points span a couple of decades. The rest of the points are year by year:

https://nces.ed.gov/fastfacts/display.asp?id=76

The article says an 812% increase since 1978. They could have easily cut down the start point to the year 2000 and still produced a startling, and more meaningful result.

Re:Control and profit

[Beeftopia]

It's time for university "non-profit" status to be re-examined, as everything they do is designed to maximize revenue.

You missed the new model

[Anonymous Coward]

The new model is to have the "free" online homework require the $120-$180 texbook "subscription". Taht way the professor doesn't have to write questions or grade homework, and you get assraped without the chance of buying a used textbook.

Re:Control and profit

[ChrisMaple]

With a webcam any textbook can be copied in an hour or less. From that time on, it's just a bunch of JPEGs that can be distributed freely until you're caught.

Do a good job photographing, and the images can be converted back to text.

The real solution..

[thesupraman]

While this is a good step, the REAL solution is to stop requiring a new edition of the textbook almost annually.

THIS is the huge scam that has created this trap for students. There is almost zero reason for these new additions, however courses often REQUIRE and actually check for them (and often have included coursework, its own scam..).

The problem? This means there is no market for the books second hand!
By allowing a collusion between publishers and courses to effectively kill second hand use of the books, we end up in this situation.

So, just REQUIRE textbooks to have a minimum 5 year life (could easily be 10 years in many subjects).
Refuse any textbooks that are 'licensed' (including non-transferable electronic versions).
Problem solved!

Wont ever happen, people are making too much money screwing over the students, who are too young and green to avoid it.

Re:The real solution..

[El Cubano]

I fear that: a) you don't have any experience teaching at the university level; and, b) you don't actually understand the problem. Let me try to educate you.

First, I teach a course at a large public university. I work full time as consultant/developer and I teach a single course as an adjunct. My motivation for doing it, you ask? I thought it would be fun and my fondest memories of my undergraduate education were three adjunct professors who were experienced industry professionals and taught only a single course: their courses were far and away the most enjoyable and relevant to me. I wanted to do something similar, to "give back," if you will.

I was handed an already developed upper division course (the previous professor had retired about the time I was hired) that covers advanced Java programming and business IT system design, so I only had to do some light/moderate updates to the course to suit my preferences and my vision for how the course would go. My total compensation: US$ ~3000/semester, for 3 hours lecture per week + 2-3 hours lecture prep per week + 2-3 hours grading per week + 2-3 hours assisting students per week (call it 10 hours per week for 14 weeks and we won't count the time I spend prior to the start of each semester getting things ready), or 140 hours over 3.5 months, or about $20/hour. As a reference, my consulting rate is right around $200/hour.

That said, I will now address your specific statements.

While this is a good step, the REAL solution is to stop requiring a new edition of the textbook almost annually.

Believe me, I have tried to stick with an older edition of my course text. The course I teach covers Java and I did not like the book the previous professor used. I did a couple of weeks of research prior to my first time teaching the course and found that there were no other decent alternatives that covered all the topics needed for the course. I was unwilling to require two or three books, so I stuck with one mediocre book at $60. That book is only four years old and I have already been getting complaints from students about how outdated it is. It has nothing on JavaFX, nothing on Java 8, etc.

THIS is the huge scam that has created this trap for students. There is almost zero reason for these new additions, however courses often REQUIRE and actually check for them (and often have included coursework, its own scam..).

Well, when I teach we all have to be in agreement about certain things. While some text books do not need to change much (I'm pretty sure algebra is the same now as it was 5 years ago), others do need to change. Java is a great example. A 5 year old Java textbook is not a good fit for my class. Remember, I am not teaching CS fundamentals here (those are probably the same as they were 20 years ago). By the way, every additional hour I spend developing course material lowers the effective hourly rate I am being paid by the university. So, since I am already teaching for 10% of what I normally charge a consulting client, I am not looking to maximize the time I spend doing what amounts to unpaid coursework development.

The problem? This means there is no market for the books second hand!

By allowing a collusion between publishers and courses to effectively kill second hand use of the books, we end up in this situation.

I can tell you that I most certainly do not collude with the publishers. The only "benefit" (if you want to call it that) I get is that as a faculty member I can request a free evaluation copy and they will likely provide it. Their expectation is, I'm sure, that I will select their book and they will get a few hundred sales. Still, for some courses, there is an amazingly limited selection for textbooks, which puts the faculty and students somewhat at the mercy of the publishers and/or authors.

So, just REQUIRE textbooks to have a minimum 5 year life (co

Re:The real solution..

[Salgak1]

Back in my undergrad days, the Engineering-track Physics I and II courses had textbooks that were huge stacks of punched stencilled pages ( required a 4-inch binder. . .). Cost, between 12 and 14 dollars, plus a 6 dollar binder.

Junior Year, both volumes came out as a textbook. 80 bucks. And, of course, enough minor changes in the exercises that the old paper editions were useless.

Oddly enough, the professor who taught the course bought a new car that year.

Funny how that works. . .

Re:The real solution..

[Gilgaron]

Programming is different than, say, general chemistry. The classes I took in fast moving fields moved so fast they printed up spiral bound texts for a relatively low fee instead of having a professionally made textbook. For general curriculum stuff like calculus, a yearly revision is unneeded.

Re: The real solution..

[AthanasiusKircher]

If this is the reason students are spending $1200 pa, why don't community colleges design their courses around last year's textbooks (which are presumably available for much less)? Very few fields of study change significantly from year to year.

As someone who has taught at the college level, I can tell you that most professors would be thrilled to do this. Unfortunately, it only really works for a year or two. The first year after a new edition comes out, there may be sufficient stock left to source a decent amount of textbooks (though they'll still be nearly full price).

The second year, you're down to mostly used copies. But the used textbook market is unreliable. You can probably get away with using the old edition for that second year, because used textbook stocks may be reliable enough. But after that, it gets harder -- the bookstore may not be able to reliably source a lot of copies. If you go on Amazon or whatever, you'll end up buying from 3rd-party sellers who often don't pay detailed attention to textbooks... resulting in inaccuracies for listings. You'll get the student who comes in and says, "I know the current edition is 7th, and you want to use 6th -- I ordered a 6th from a used seller, but they sent me the 5th edition! Can I use it?"

A large number of students don't sell textbooks back, particularly if they already bought them used and it's an old edition that they won't make much money off of. So the used market dries up after a couple years.

And most textbooks (except in very active fields) aren't actually releasing new editions EVERY year. Instead, it's often every 3 or 4 or 5 years, which is long enough to "dry up" any used market and force everyone to upgrade.

Believe me -- I know there are always plenty of stories of professors who teach from their own books and want to make loads of money. But the majority of professors don't write textbooks, and they're often happy to stay on a consistent edition (and save students money). Who wants to update course materials to take into account all the exercise numbers changing from edition to edition, the minor rearrangements of text, etc., etc.?

You need a bit of critical thinking here

[thesupraman]

Sorry, but you are completely wrong about student loans.

I know its very 'fashionable' to harp on that you should be able to drop them like a hot potato the week you graduate, but that would be a disaster, and in no way addresses the root problem.
Why a disaster? Because graduates are graduates. A large number of them would see this as a free lunch, and jump on it, declaring bankrupcy just to clear the debt (after all, they have almost nothing to lose here..), and THEN starting building their carreer with a problem. The 'punishments' of a bankrupcy will be of little consequence to them for the immediate future.
Therefore such risk in such loans will skyrocket, and availability will collapse, and interest rates will skyrocket.
We would immediately see a backlash from THE VERY PEOPLE WHO WANT THIS, claiming 'only the rich can now get an education!' and we will be back to square one.

The ACTUAL problem is the bullshit worldview that everyone needs a degree. THIS is what pushes demand to stupid levels, and created this whole problem in the first place.
Any sane education system has (and has respect for..) universities, technical institutes, apprenticeships, on job training, and just good old 'getting a job' as perfectly valid paths. THIS IS HOW IT SHOULD BE. Only the more intellectual 5% should ever be going to university, and having the other 80% there only harms those top thinkers by holding them back in a sea of mediocrity. Everyone else should be pursuing much less expensive, quicker, and more useful trade training.

But no, we need to be inclusive, no ones feelings can be hurt, everyone MUST have a degree to prove what a unique and special snowflake they are.

THAT, ladies and gentlemen, is the problem.

Re:You need a bit of critical thinking here

[swb]

I think you're pretty much dead on. I'd only differ in that I think student loan debt should be dischargeable, but inversely proportional to the time since the education was obtained. All assets depreciate in value and an education isn't really all that different, and inverse proportion depreciation prevents short-term discharge after graduation without the punishment that would be inflicted on someone whose finances otherwise allow them to declare bankruptcy. I think part of the escalating college cost/loan cycle needs some negative feedback loop -- lending should have risk, without it they lend irresponsibly and all it ends up being is inflationary.

But you're absolutely right about the "everyone doesn't need a degree" stuff. Most people go to college because they don't know better and are only in it for the signaling value that a degree supposedly has to employers.

College loans are basically a subsidy to corporations who would otherwise have to provide training and education to their employees and even if it provides some vocational value, it's a horribly inefficient -- the overlap between what's learned in school and what has vocational value to employers is really small.

Re:You need a bit of critical thinking here

[Tvingo]

The 'fix' for student loans if for the schools to 'co-sign' the loan with the student. The student can only discharge the dept back to the school after X number of years of paying Y% of their salaries towards the loan. You figure out the X and Y with some negotiations but the end result is if you go into a field where there is no way to pay off the loan in X years paying Y% of the salary then the school should never have loaded you the money in the first place. One of two things happen, schools either don't give out loans for those majors anymore or they reduce the cost of the major. No longer are kids getting 100's of thousands in student loans for art history because the school will end up eating that cost in X years.

Payola in universities

[CrankyOldEngineer]

The problem is not availability of economical textbooks. It's publishers paying off administrators. Our local community college uses nearly 100% Pearson textbooks. Many of them are custom printed in binders specifically for that school and are required. Supposedly they are custom designed for the requirements of that school. But there is nothing unique about them and in fact they are practically identical to other community college textbooks except for numbering and questions/problems. They cost around $200, and they change every year so students can't buy&sell or borrow. I would love to meet the the asshat responsible.

Smoke and Mirrors

[chill]

Open source textbooks, reference material, and study guides are plentiful. Used textbooks are cheap. Amazon has a great service providing them.

Colleges and Universities frequently require the use of online, "digital learning systems", like Cengage. Access to that site, where the homework is, requires a subscription code that can be hundreds of dollars. A textbook without the "online access code" is a doorstop.

If schools are serious about this, they need to start pushing the use of Moodle instead of Blackboard, and providing high quality open source content including lesson plans, homework, and textbooks.