Sarah Faye Cohen Managing Director / Open Textbook Network open.umn.edu

Possibilities for libraries in open education

Open to Opportunity

This is about a journey.

Course Reserves

Course Reserves• Students looking for textbooks

• Faculty meeting that need

• The library cultivating relationships with faculty and students through reserves

• Long lines

• Too few copies

• Too many copies for the library’s space

• Desk ”traffic patterns”

Operationally, we “fixed” the problem.

Policies

Processes

Communications

Facilities

Feedback

“There’s an open education conference in Vancouver, BC. You should go.”

“There’s an open education conference in Vancouver, BC. You should go.”

“There’s an open education conference in Vancouver, BC. You should go.”

Defining Open Educational ResourcesHewlett Foundation Definition:

“OER are teaching, learning, and research resources that reside in the public domain or are released under an intellectual property license that permits their free use and repurposing by others”

That’s where I met Dave Ernst.

Open Content

OER

Open Textbooks

Why Textbooks?• Hits a major pain point – textbook costs• Faculty understand textbooks• Faculty know how to adopt textbooks• Faculty effort (vs. alternatives) is kept at a minimum• Textbooks can provide content for a complete (or nearly complete)

course

How does open education fit into the libraries’ landscape?

The cost barrier kept2.4 million

low and moderate-income college-qualified high school graduates from

completing college in the previous decade.

The Advisory Committee on Student Financial Assistance http://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED529499.pdf

A Lens Into Libraries

Open is “disruptive” to libraries

open = free + permissions

open = free + permissions

open = free + permissions

copy mixshare keepedit use

Libraries risk their “stamp of approval”

• OER and authority, reliability, sustainability.• Information Literacy & Instruction• Research materials• Relationships• Metrics

Library resources are not “open”, only “available” within your institution.

1986

1987

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1992

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1995

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1999

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2011

-25%

25%

75%

125%

175%

225%

275%

325%

375%

425%

Graph 2 Monograph and Serial Costs in ARL Libraries, 1986-2011*

Source: ARL Statistics 2010-11 Association of Research Libraries, Washington, D.C.*Includes electronic resources from 1999-2000 onward.

% C

hang

e Si

nce

1986

Serial Ex-penditures(+402%)

Monograph Ex-penditures(+71%)

Monographs Purchased (10%)

www.sparcopen.org

How does open fit into what libraries already do?

How does open fit into what libraries already do?• Scholarly Communication • Institutional Repositories• Information Literacy Curriculum• Instruction and Outreach• Access Services • Interlibrary Loan • Reserves• Collection Development and Collections Management• Electronic Resources Management • Cataloging, Indexing, Metadata

Leverage our expertise

• Organizing information and making it accessible

Leverage our expertise

• Organizing information and making it accessible• Leverage libraries’ work thus far

Leverage our expertise

• Organizing information and making it accessible• Leverage libraries’ work thus far• A trusted resource and bridge to

faculty

Collaborate deeply with faculty.• Actualize librarians’ deep interest in creative and innovative

pedagogy.• Realize the potential of the 5Rs.• Use OERs in the flipped classrooms, as well as inquiry based learning,

problem based learning, active learning.• Stimulate tangible partnerships with Centers for Teaching and

Learning, Instructional Designers, Distance Education, and more.

Leverage our expertise

• Organizing information and making it accessible• Leverage libraries’ work thus far• A trusted resource and bridge to

faculty• Surface information habits of

users, especially students

Integrate open into current and new instruction• ACRL Framework: Threshold Concepts• Open’s potential to address many of the TCs:

• Format as process• Authority as Constructed and Contextual• Information as commodity

• Assessment opportunities:• Creation and modification with students using open content would allow

libraries to provide direct assessment /artifacts of student learning and achievement in these TCs.

Build connections to:• ACRL's strategic direction

for libraries: • expressing the value of libraries,

student learning, and active participation in the research and scholarly environment.

• Intersections in Scholarly Communication and Information Literacy • Other open initiatives (OA,

open data, knowledge commons, etc).

There is still much to be done.• Accessibility• Discovery• Integration• Tools for editing, authoring,

metadata• Metrics• Preservation• Outreach• What else?

Good news.

Open Textbook Network

The Open Textbook Network is an alliance of colleges and universities committed to access, affordability, and student academic success through the use of open textbooks.

Members include 31 individual academic libraries and 7 library consortia (representing 147 libraries).

We’re 44 members representing about 250 campuses.

We’ll see you soon!• Monroe Training: Thursday, Dec. 15

• New Orleans Training: Thursday, Jan. 12

• Space for up to 40 participants at each training .

• An RSVP system to ensure that each institution is able to send at least one representative.

• Includes lunch (yum!)

Thank you!

@thesheck@open_textbooks

sfcohen@umn.edu