We have to start reducing the cost of textbooks to the students and, hopefully, increasing the money being given to the authors. With today's publishing and marketing models, this can be accomplished. Someone can write a textbook, give it away on-line, or have it published on-demand for a small cost, much of which is retained by the author.
I will be scheduling some sessions discussing what is out there and how to find it.
If you want to look into this before I start the faculty sessions, do the following.
1. Read the article in today's Miami Hurricane:
http://tinyurl.com/osbooks
2. Then look at some example Open Textbooks that cost around $30 published and can often be downloaded for FREE:
http://www.maketextbooksaffordable.org/statement.asp?id2=37633#mainexamples
3. Go to the top of the page and read about Open Textbooks.
4. Look at a longer list of Open Textbooks by going to:
http://www.maketextbooksaffordable.org/statement.asp?id2=37633#mainexamples
These are some of the activities that we will be doing in the Faculty Exploratory during my sessions on Open Textbooks. Be thinking about it. If you have anything to share, let me know.
I need to state that my son will, hopefully, be starting at UM in the Fall of 2011 and my daughter in Fall of 2013. This project is somewhat self-serving, since I would rejoice at reducing the $700-$1,000 per year for textbooks.
Bill Vilberg
