He clarified that he means "textbook-free, not free textbooks." Hence #OpenTextbooks (#OER) won't satisfy him. But he encourages OER as if they would.
Faculty criticized him for “encouraging [them] to invest significant time” in creating “#OpenAccess materials" (OER) rather than using or improving materials from publishers.
@petersuber@academicchatter I'm a big fan of using #OER but it is far from free. Instructors often need to supplement the OER materials with their own homework, videos, or examples to match what comes bundled with many texts from large publishers.
@fronch@petersuber@academicchatter Supplementing materials doesn't mean the materials cost you money. It means you need additional learning resources that may or may not cost money. That's an important distinction.
@gabrielfp@petersuber@academicchatter Sorry if I wasn't being clear. My point is that #OER aren't "free" if they require the instructor to do lots of extra labor to provide an equivalent educational experience to students. Especially not if the instructor is an already-criminally-underpaid #adjunct
During my time as a teacher in the mid noughties I never had access to OER material and the commercial resources required lots of extra labour to use them for lessons.
I had assumed it was just how teaching resources work. Is that me or a common experience?
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