Jim Luke [teaching] » books http://jimluke.com Resources for My Students, My Teaching Portfolio, and What I've Been Doing to Justify My Pay as a Professor Wed, 11 Apr 2012 21:22:54 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 Open Textbooks Nearby http://jimluke.com/2010/03/open-textbooks-nearby/ http://jimluke.com/2010/03/open-textbooks-nearby/#comments Wed, 24 Mar 2010 23:47:38 +0000 jimluke http://jimluke.com/?p=361 No sooner do I make a post about open textbooks and the impact it could have on community colleges, then there’s a news item in the local Lansing State Journal about a retired Michigan State Univ prof that’s written an open textbook about organic chemistry that’s being used in our own backyard, as well as around the world:

Ex-MSU prof writes free online textbook | lansingstatejournal.com | Lansing State Journal.

]]> http://jimluke.com/2010/03/open-textbooks-nearby/feed/ 0 Open Education Resources / Open Textbooks http://jimluke.com/2010/03/open-education-resources-open-textbooks/ http://jimluke.com/2010/03/open-education-resources-open-textbooks/#comments Sun, 21 Mar 2010 02:14:18 +0000 jimluke http://jimluke.com/?p=353 I had a discussion the other day with a couple colleagues where the issue of textbook costs arose.  I am a huge advocate of open educational resources and open textbooks (see If You Believe in “Intellectual Property”, How Do You Teach Others? – Answer: you can’t). I also know from my consulting work in the 1990′s that there’s no real reason why textbooks should be as expensive as they are today.  Print-on-demand can bring the costs down dramatically.

So I thought I would add a few links to the blog for those interested in getting started investigating the idea:

Finally, I have new post at my economics blog about the Economic Alchemy: How to Raise Tuition but Lower Student Costs.  Also, I advise that people not confuse “online books” with “low-cost” or “open”.  Yes, “open textbooks” and newer low-cost books can be put online. But the “online books” being promoted by the major oligopoly publishers are NOT low-cost solutions.  In practice, they major publisher solutions like CourseSmart actually end up raising student costs.  For more about that, see my post on Online Books.

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