Monday, April 29, 2019

Let's Work Together!


Open Educational Resources as a Campus Initiative

Panel presentation by Katie Dawson, Joshua Stockley and Will Rogers. 

To get buy-in on campus, you need to engage faculty.  The presenters started with the faculty professional development department, through a learning community.  The community met monthly and represented by 10 different academic disciplines at difference levels in their career.  Early findings indicated that many of these individuals were using OER but didn’t realize what it was or what that meant.

The presenters had moderate goals for the year.  In first semester, in one lesson in one course, use an open resource.  In second semester use OER in one course.  The final responsibility for the year was to create a professional development activity for your peers.

Joshua Stockley:
So what is it and what did it look like? Pretty much anything that you can find that is open access.  It is not just an open, free textbook.  Really anything that students do not have to pay for - open access, but also library resources.

Takeaways: 
  • We need to do better for our financially distressed students
  • Some disciplines are further along than others
  • Cost, interactivity, format (tablet, phone, etc., mobile students) but still has pedagogical value
  • Sense of community, share experiences from different perspectives
  • What works online, is different than what works F2F - we have to cognizant of that

Will Rogers
Works in the digital humanities where there is already a reliance on online materials because there is no access to the original manuscripts.  He teaches Medieval Literature.

Many of his students are a car battery away from dropping out of university (in other words, the item that makes or breaks their financial planning)

When teaching educators (Department of Education, future teachers), or even other leaders, they can take the resource with them and use it in their future career, or use it to educate others.  He has students create a binder of resources throughout the semester.  He uses experimental learning, not just reading the textbook.  For example: look at this resource and come in and talk about what you discovered.  Where there errors in the text?  Did another scholar refute or support this text?  Students can help teach the concepts to their peers in class.  Opens up more information and resources than the instructor would be able to work with in class.

Key Takeaway: Teach less, but more deeply, students will be invested

From what they are seeing , if students can easily use what they have in front of them, then their grades will improve.  Generally students do not have the inclination to purchase textbooks, so they will go elsewhere.  Course work and materials should be seamless and easy.

Other options for faculty incentives: 
  • Course release if creating a text
  • Connect faculty with communities across the country - collaboration opportunities, network opportunity
  • Libraries can be the pinnacle of change on campus - create a hub for learning, discussion and collaboration on campus

All it takes is to start with a blanket email, and then targeted follow up, and finally a directive discussion with a small group of OER leaders.

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