Open Education 2017

The proposed panel will consist of academic library and higher education administrators from campuses that have successful open education (OE) initiatives. Individuals considered for the panel include academic library managers, associate deans, and deans; directors of centers for teaching and learning; directors of distance education services; and provosts or assistant/vice-provosts. Efforts will be made to include administrators from a variety of campus types (research-intensive universities, smaller/private universities/colleges, and community colleges). Panelists will discuss how they are paving the way for front-line librarians and faculty as they break new ground in OE arenas. Possible discussion topics include the following:

- How do we make decisions about allotting staff time to OE? Who should have ownership of OE responsibilities (librarians, faculty members, instructional designers, others)? Should those responsibilities be shared across a number of individuals or spearheaded by one person?

- How do we open doors across campus for these front-line faculty/staff?

- How can we secure access to student data for librarians and faculty to ensure that they are investing time and resources in the right places on our campus?

- Where can we find funding for OE initiatives, such as grant programs to incentivize faculty to adopt, adapt, and create OER or to design and implement open pedagogy projects in their classrooms?

- How can we adjust faculty promotion and tenure expectations to include work they are doing to adapt/create OER or engage in open pedagogical practices?

Librarian and faculty attendees working on nascent OE initiatives and those whose work is more established will benefit from this panel by learning about novel, concrete ideas with which they can approach administrators to ask for support. Administrator attendees will also benefit from hearing the experiences and advice of their peers on diverse campuses where OE initiatives have been successful.

Thomas Edison State University, a pioneer in adult education, and Saylor Academy, a leader in the Open Education movement, have collaborated on the development of a brand new Associates of Arts in Liberal Studies degree program, which will be both competency based and openly licensed.

Using a framework developed by Thomas Edison, made up of 57 unique competencies, spread over 3 broad knowledge groups, and 16 competency domains, Saylor has been creating open learning modules aligned to each competency. The result of this effort, once paired with learning assessments designed and administered by TESU, will be a first of its kind, openly licensed CBE degree program.

Everything from the competency framework itself, the 57 individual learning modules, assessment rubrics, and the learning resources curated within the modules (to date, approximately 2,800 pieces of OER have been vetted by SMEs for inclusion), will be openly licensed, so that even students not pursuing this degree directly with TESU will be able to benefit from its creation. Likewise, other institutions looking to expand OER adoption, or pursue the offering of a CBE degree themselves, will have the opportunity to use what has been created, in part or in whole, to drastically speed up the time of development and innovation. Further, by providing the competency curriculum openly, TESU hopes to provide a foundation for discussions around unified CBE standards that will not only advance the field pedagogically, but also from a technological and regulatory standpoint.



During the presentation, TESU and Saylor will discuss the design of this unique program, as well as the motivations for investing in the creation of a degree program that not only uses OER to help reduce costs for students, but is itself an OER. The discussion will also focus on the important benefits that a CBE program can have for adult learners, and the ways that OER further help to meet the needs of adult and nontraditional learners.

In an effort to fulfill Pima Community College's OER course development goals for Achieving the Dream, the presenters and members of their Center for Learning Technology team recently created two first-year writing courses utilizing only OER content. This presentation will provide a practical guide for instructors seeking to transition to an OER-only or OER-supplemented first-year composition course within a four-month timeline. The presentation will cover sharing and brainstorming strategies, aligning outcomes, designing assignments, identifying relevant OER resources, evaluating OER content, and modifying OER content to support course learning outcomes. The presenters will also discuss benefits and best practices related to teaching first-year composition with OER content, as well as ways to work with instructional designers and share OER content with other faculty and throughout the college. This presentation relates directly to the follow conference themes: Models Supporting the Adoption, Use, or Sustaining of OER in Higher Education, Open Pedagogy and Open Educational Practices, and The Role of Faculty in Advocating for, Supporting, or Sustaining OER Adoption and Use.

At Salt Lake Community College we have a robust OER initiative which cuts across several disciplines and modalities of instruction. The English department has taken up the OER initiative and developed a flexible OER composition program grounded in theoretical frameworks within English studies and the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning. The open curricular design of the program actively promotes freedom and creativity in the delivery of our composition courses, while also building programmatic cohesiveness through a shared commitment to common student goals and outcomes.

Because of our institution's open access mission, diversity is both our greatest asset for teaching and learning and one of our primary challenges as teachers tasked with writing instruction. Threshold theory has been a generative framework for us to design and implement a composition program that uses OERs and open pedagogy to respond to local needs and values. Threshold concepts--particular concepts within a discipline that are viewed as central to understanding the subject (Meyer and Land)--have been our vehicle to draw attention to what matters most in the curriculum, thereby providing our faculty with a conceptual foundation from which to build our OERs through both curation and authorship. Threshold concepts have also encouraged us to practice open pedagogies that engage students in recursive, problem-based, and transformational learning.

In this panel, SLCC academic staff and English department faculty discuss the theoretical frameworks that guide their work and intersect with OER, including threshold concepts, open online instruction, studio models, writing center theory and theories of team teaching. We argue that successful OER initiatives must consider how the theoretical frameworks that already circulate within one's local context work with and against the larger goals of open pedagogy, especially in open access institutions such as SLCC.

Since the 12th Annual Open Education Conference, staff members at Boise State University and Clemson University have sought to establish and grow institution-wide initiatives around open educational resources (OER). Despite holding a shared identity as public universities, these two institutions –one located in the Northwestern and one in the Southeastern United States –harbor distinct cultures, climates, and agendas as they relate to the sustainable implementation and support of OER. Simply stated, staff from Boise State and Clemson somehow continue to find common solutions for supporting OER despite their differences.

Over the last two years, librarians, researchers, technologists, and instructional designers of both universities have consulted each other, joined interinstitutional networks, launched pilot programs, rallied student groups, cultivated faculty learning communities, modified digital infrastructure, and shared a few resources under the notion that open access to education complements the missions of their respective institutions. And while projects have been implemented at the institutional level, certain variables remain that help and hinder proliferation of OER at each university.

If vague support from senior administrators, limited resources for sharing and modifying texts, inconsistent faculty awareness and availability, varying priorities between campus stakeholders, and uncertainty about recurring funding can be considered common threats to long-lasting OER programs in higher ed., the members of this panel (having faced these issues firsthand) continue to claim that the best approach toward tackling such problems is one that transparently spans disciplines, departments, and institutions.

Through much sharing, gratitude, and hopefulness, panel members will discuss their recent experiences in driving, supporting, and sustaining OER together from opposite corners of the U.S.

Eleven schools from across the United States began the OpenStax Institutional Partner program in July 2017 and have already increased the number students impacted by over 18,000 per year, saving an additional $1.7 million per year! This presentation will cover the basic structure used in the program, including the emphasis on a support community, to ensure success and use the data from the program to highlight the top strategies that work to greatly increase adoptions in a short period of time.

Come make live music with your OpenEd colleagues! Join the OpenEd Jam Session to be part of our live, unrehearsed - and yet somehow not terrible - band. And if you don't play an instrument or consider yourself a singer, come spend an evening relaxing and listening to live music. 

The OpenEd conference provides a set of basic band instruments - drum kit, guitars, bass, keyboard, and microphones. You're encouraged to bring additional instruments - like a saxophone, trumpet, clarinet, harmonica, triangle, or cowbell - with you to the conference. Check this Google Doc to suggest a song or sign up to play an instrument:

http://bit.ly/opened17jamsesh

If necessary, please be sure to bring your phone or tablet so you'll be able to see the music for the songs we'll play!

This is one of the most fun parts of the conference - we hope to see you there!

Here's some video from the original OpenEd12 Jam Session to whet your appetite...

Sparked by three innovative faculty members, rising student advocacy, and a supportive legislature, the Connecticut State Colleges and Universities System implemented a grant program to support the adoption of OER including MyOpenMath to reduce the cost of current commercial textbook & homework site solutions being implemented in 100 level Math courses across the 17 institution system. This session will review the selfless work of three community college instructors, the role of student advocacy and a legislative OER Task Force on the creation of the Open Math Grant program and the results of those efforts to date.

As a university with a deep commitment to social justice, SF State is striving to reduce the cost of course materials to students by encouraging greater use of OER on our campus. One of the challenges we face as we seek to promote adoption of OER has been how best to reach and support faculty in this process.

Most OER projects implemented on our campus to date have been faculty driven. Based on the diversity of projects put forth by these early adopters, we realized that there would be no one size fits all model of support. We needed to find a way to empower these early adopting faculty, who best know the needs and challenges of OER adoption within their disciplines, to communicate the value of OER other faculty and to support in the OER process. Our OER faculty ambassador program attempts to fill this support gap.

Additionally, because choice of instructional materials is considered a crucial part of academic freedom at SF State, a key aspect of reaching faculty has been conveying the value of OER adoption: to students, to our campus and to the faculty themselves. By arming faculty ambassadors with data, support materials, best practices and more, they are able take ownership over OER advocacy and reach faculty who might otherwise not become part of the conversation.

This session explores the terrain of providing support for faculty in adopting OER, and describes how SF State's OER team developed an ambassador program that cultivated faculty ownership of advancement of OER on our campus. Presenters will describe the collaboration between faculty ambassadors and instructional designers in planning and customizing each ambassador's model of support. Presenters will also report progress of ambassador led projects that are currently underway, including successes, challenges and lessons learned.

From the founding of CCCOER in California in 2007 to a statewide requirement that colleges and universities identify OER classes in class schedules by 2018, California has long been involved in OER. California Community Colleges (CCCs) serve 2.5 million students, over 30% of all community college students in the US, or 11% of all US undergraduates, so the impact of OER work in California can be significant.

In 2016, the California legislature allocated funding to create Zero Textbook Cost degrees and certificates in California Community Colleges. Up to 25 CCCs will be funded to develop ZTC degrees and certificates. The first round of grants was awarded in January 2017; a second round will be awarded in January 2018. Coordinators of overall state efforts will share the current status of statewide efforts and solicit input from the field on moving forward.

The California State University - MERLOT was awarded a cooperative agreement with the US Department of Labor to create and support the national open repository of OER for workforce development being produced by over 700 community colleges funding by about $2 billion in grants from the TAACCCT (Trade Adjustment Assistance for Community Colleges and Career Training) program.

SkillsCommons is the open online repository for the TAACCCT OER (www.skillscommons.org.) SkillsCommons has captured and preserved the OER developed by grantees and enables easy discovery of the OER for reuse. Adoption of TAACCCT OER beyond the people who developed the OER and sustaining the TAACCCT OER collection and community after the funding ends is being addressed by supporting the community of creators and users of SkillsCommons and TAACCCT resources by leveraging the CSU-MERLOT strategy.

The presentation will demonstrate how to use SkillsCommons by browsing through the collection by industry, by type of credential (associates degree, certificate, latticed/stacked credential, etc.), by type of materials (e.g. online course module, fully online course, tutorials, simulations, etc.), by institution and grant project. The requirements for the instructional materials and program support materials included the content having a Creative Commons license (CC BY), being accessible (section 508 compliant) and being developed with principles of universal design for learning. SkillsCommons SUPPORT SERVICES Center provides any institution guidelines and resources to fulfill these requirements and the SkillsCommons CONNECT Center provides a range of online community and social media tools to help faculty and staff connect with the right people and resources easily. Finally, participants will learn how to efficiently customize online educational content for reuse, revision, and redistribution and accelerate the development and implementation of online programs.

There is no program more appropriate for transforming to textbook-free than an instructional design degree.

When our campus launched a training program for faculty to adopt affordable and open course content, the director of our Master of Science in Instructional Design and Technology (MSIDT) program signed up all of her faculty. A year later, every single one of the program's courses have no additional cost for instructional materials beyond the cost of tuition.

A transformation this quick resulted in a hybrid model: faculty use a variety of library-licensed content, open educational resources, and external web content to eliminate textbook costs for students.

While already successful, the journey has just begun. The program's director, faculty, and liaison librarian continue to work to locate and adapt the perfect instructional resources. One course has a unique textbook that is out-of-print, so our campus used a grant to hire a third party vendor to develop custom content. Program faculty continue to remix their chosen resources to include better accessibility features and to incorporate Universal Design principles.

In this presentation, the MSIDT Director will describe her motivation, goals, and victories, as well as the challenges with enacting a transformation of this magnitude. MSIDT's liaison librarian (also the campus Instructional Design Librarian) will discuss her role in advising on library-licensed content, copyright, and OER identification, as well as her experience teaching with these resources in her dual role as a part-time MSIDT faculty member.

This 25 minute presentation focuses on what Ivy Tech Community College, the nation's largest singly accredited community college system, has done to scale its OER initiative across the entire state of Indiana. The presentation will explore four distinct and important ingredients of scalability including the need to have a defining and foundational purpose, and the important nature of a diverse cross-discipline team to be the face and the decision-making body for the OER initiative itself. Other areas of investigation that will be touched upon will be the importance of having an initiative that's financially independent and self-sustaining, as well as having content building and maintenance processes that heavily engage and involve faculty curriculum decision-makers, leading to increased OER education and adoption. For a more in-depth description please see https://docs.google.com/document/d/1p4kP41Xw2RJc-Y1c2hD0ytgwphRxjvRwSsqKY4cApno/edit?usp=sharing

Members of the Santa Ana College OER Faculty Work group have taken a strategic team approach to developing the college's OER degree pathways tied to its Liberal Arts and Business Administration associate degrees. Team members will present on their unique roles within the planning process, involving the selection of courses to be included in each pathway, locating appropriate OER materials, assisting instructors with an SLO-based mapping process involved with course transformation, and collaborating with campus stakeholders to promote OER initiatives. Overarching logistics, successes, and challenges will be detailed. Additionally, participants will have the opportunity to strategize course mapping efforts pertinent to their institution's unique OER vision and stakeholders.

Bucks County Community College (PA) is engaged in the final year of a two-year, funded initiative to transition sections of eleven high-enrollment courses to the use of open educational resources and library resources that are free to students. Recognizing a need to shape the whole course and not simply substitute OER for commercial textbooks, the initiative brings together faculty course developers, faculty librarians, an instructional designer and a Universal Design for Learning (UDL) consultant who work together to transform the entire course, resulting in new course templates in the learning management system that are effective, engaging and accessible and that can be retained, reused and revised by other course instructors. A coordinator of the project will guide attendees through the process and the results so far.

Learn how a community college is developing a Career Technical Education certificate built entirely around OER, with strong involvement of industry experts and industry advisory boards. College of the Canyons' program in Water Technology awards a 21-unit Certificate of Achievement, with select specializations. In addition to a typical workflow for producing open textbooks, the Water Technology program has involved industry experts as authors and used industry advisory boards as reviewers.