University Business - March 2011 - (Page 18)

Behind the news Textbooks for the Masses As people debAte the cost of college education, the price of textbooks inevitably comes up. It’s a pain point both the state and federal government have scrutinized. students have long worked around the issue through buying or trading used books and searching out alternate sources online. At the end of January, the opencourseWare program at the University of California, Irvine held a forum to introduce faculty to other textbook options, primarily open textbooks, which have more liberal licensing restrictions. “Instructors are more and more conscious of the cost of textbooks to students,” says gary W. Matkin, dean of continuing education, distance learning, and summer session. price concerns, government intervention, and the greater availability of digital information are all combining to drive the open courseware movement, he says. faculty have two main approaches to the high cost of textbooks— “either they feel it is wrong and have empathy, or they are concerned about the impact on their ability to teach,” says eric frank, president and co-founder of flat World Knowledge, a publishing company providing a platform for open textbooks. Another appeal is that open textbooks allow faculty members to rearrange chapters, add or delete material, and otherwise provide students with lower-cost texts that are customized to the class in print or digital form. “the ability to deliver at just the right point in the learning process just the right information is [revolutionary],” agrees Matkin, adding that no longer will syllabi instruct students to skip certain chapters in an expensive textbook. An appeal for college administrators is a way to keep costs down and make parents and students happy. “If you talk to high-level administrators about exit surveys, you’ll find the cost of textbooks is a high one,” says frank. Although the open textbook movement is currently being driven by passionate people, it will eventually grow into the mainstream similar to the way open source software did. Uc Irvine is helping with that growth. “We had a tremendous turnout. there were 146 people that attended the live webcast and then another 50 that attended the on-campus event. We were very happy with the results,” says Kathy tam, communications specialist to the dean of continuing education at the university. “from our point of view, it’s important to bring the issue of open textbooks to our campus as part of our greater opencourseWare mission.” the archive of the webinar is available at http://tinyurl.com/65uw23q. —A.M. U emotional health envy The adage ThaT The grass is greener on the other side could resonate with this year’s freshman class, who rated their emotional health in comparison to their peers’ at the lowest level in 25 years, according to results published by the higher education research institute (heri) at UCLA from its 2010 Cooperative institutional research Program (CirP) freshman survey. The CirP is administered to incoming freshmen during summer orientation or the first few weeks of class and is designed to gather information about students’ experiences leading up to college and their college expectations, life goals, attitudes, and experiences, says Linda deangelo, assistant director of research for the survey. The report reveals that the percentage of students reporting their emotional health was in the “highest 10 percent” or “above average,” when compared to their peers, dropped by 3.4 percent from 2009, from 55.3 percent to 51.9 percent— the lowest level since the question was first asked in 1985. Women are 13.2 percent less likely than men to report high levels of emotional health. “This signals to us that students are perceiving that their emotional health is lower than what they think it should be, in terms of being lower in comparison to their peers,” says deangelo. The heri recommends higher ed leaders help combat these findings by encouraging students to be active and socialize with their peers, and deangelo says it’s important for college and university leaders to be aware of the implications mental health can have on being successful educationally. “students who are under emotional stress and overwhelmed don’t always make the best decisions in terms of time management,” she says. “Universities really need to think about how to outreach their wellness services so students who need those services can take advantage of them.” The study—which also covers student financial concerns and views on the economy and politics; numbers of students identifying themselves as having a disability; beliefs on gay and lesbian adoption rights; and expectations of satisfaction and participation in college activities— was based on responses from 201,818 students at 279 colleges and universities. a summary can be viewed at www.heri.ucla .edu; the full report is also available for purchase online ($15 for a PdF, $25 for a hard copy). —K.D. 18 | March 2011 universitybusiness.com http://www.tinyurl.com/65uw23q http://www.heri.ucla.edu http://www.heri.ucla.edu http://www.universitybusiness.com

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of University Business - March 2011

University Business - March 2011
Contents
Editor’s Note
College Index
Company Index
Advisory Board
Behind the News
Sense of Place
Viewpoint
Human Resources
Universities and Investment Fraud
Going the Distance
Meeting the Transparent Pricing Mandate
Community Colleges
What’s New
End Note

University Business - March 2011