The recent UCI OpenCourseWare forum on Open Textbooks was a success from several points of view – attendance, substantive discussion, and, hopefully, a new impetus toward authoring and adoption.
Eric Frank, President of FlatWorld Knowledge, a for-profit open text publisher, described a business model where authors do better by the fourth quarter of sales and in which students can choose from a range of options – free viewing on the Internet, and a variety of low costs for options ranging to printed full-color textbooks.
Steve Carson, from MIT’s OpenCourseWare project, described powerful institutional benefits to openness – from student recruitment to better instructional materials to better student decision-making when selecting courses.
Mike Dennin, professor of Physics and Astronomy, and the Chair of the UCI Educational Policy Council made a key clarification about the likelihood of adoption of open textbooks. He noted that Flat World had retained the traditional publishing model of peer review and editing. This, he said, provides the assurance that a faculty member isn’t wasting his time when evaluating a text for adoption. It is really the prerequisite for adoption.
The full event is available for viewing here.