North Seattle CC Open Textbooks, Technology Plan & eLearning Cable Green eLearning Director

Is Globalization real? seamless connection of people, resources & knowledge digitization of content mobile, personal global platform for collaboration outsourcing open-sourcing

And we can make all of our “digital stuff” available to all people… and most of it will get used... by someone.

"According to an IBM study, by 2010, the amount of digital information in the world will double every 11 hours."

How do we Deal with This? We are preparing students for jobs that don’t yet exist, using technologies that haven’t been invented, to solve problems we don’t even know are problems yet.

(1) eLearning Why call it “eLearning?”

“Distance” is about geographic separation. “eLearning” is about leveraging the unique affordances of digital technologies to support new ways of learning in new spaces.  Online, Hybrid, Enhanced “eLearning”

eLearning in Context Growth in online enrollments far exceeds overall enrollment growth.  CTC system FTE growth Fall 2007 up 1%, online enrollments increased 15% Online + hybrid = 19.6% 3.5 million students are taking at least one online course  = 20%of all U.S. higher education students.

Washington Community & Technical Colleges Online Courses: Fall 07 13,473 FTE online  equivalent to 2.5 Community Colleges Over 72,000 students learn online each year 45% of all CTC graduates earn 15 or more credits via eLearning

Growth in Online Courses Fall FTE: growth = 715%

Why does this growth curve matter?

Educate More Citizens HECB Master Plan  I. Raise educational attainment to create prosperity, opportunity Policy Goal: Increase the total number of degrees and certificates produced annually to achieve Global Challenge State benchmarks. By 2018, raise mid-level degrees and certificates to 36,200 annually, an increase of 9,400 degrees annually.

… if North Seattle CC doesn’t offer online courses and excellent online student services … someone else will… and students will choose.

(2) Open Educational Resources

State of the Art (and Open / FREE)

Because when we cooperate and share, we all win – exponentially. Reed ʼ s Law: Networks grow [in value] exponentially by the number of nodes. It’s a social justice issue: everyone has the right to access global knowledge. Why is “Open” Important? Institute for the Future whitepaper: Technologies of Cooperation

Definition of OER Digitized materials, offered freely and openly for educators, students, to use and re-use for teaching, learning and research.

What about Copyright / IP? CC Video

- JSB

OpenLearn (UK) - DEMO OpenLearn (UK) OCW – MIT (MIT HS) OCW – MITMIT HS  China Open Resources for Education has translated 109 MIT OCW courses into Simplified Chinese. China Open Resources for Education Rice Connexions (a few) Open Content Repositories

and there is this small collection of articles:

What are Open Textbooks? “Open textbooks” are free, online, open-access textbooks. The content of open textbooks is licensed to allow anyone to use, download, customize, or print without expressed permission from the author. Examples of Free, Open Textbooks

Why do we Need Open Textbooks? 2005 GAO report: College textbook prices have risen at twice the rate of annual inflation over the last two decades At 2-year public institutions, the average cost of books and supplies per first-time, full-time student (’03-’04) was $886 = almost 75% of the cost of tuition and fees  $898 at 4-year public institutions, about 26% of the cost of tuition and fees

May, 2007: Dept of Ed.

We must get rid of our “not invented here” attitude regarding others’ content  move to: "proudly borrowed from there" Content is not a strategic advantage Nor can we (or our students) afford it:  Students want open, free textbooks Hey Higher Ed!

“As uncomfortable a proposition as this new openness may be for some, I believe it is the future of higher education.” In web 2.0, everything is public & higher education needs to get used to it. Future of Openness in Education David Wiley Open source, openness, and higher education.

(3) Strategic Technology Plan

Strategy I: Create a single, system-wide suite of online teaching and learning tools that provides all Washington students with easy access to “anywhere, anytime” learning. Strategy II: Create a seamless P-20 system for personalized online student services including: recruitment, retention, advising, course catalogue, transfer, and financial aid management. Strategy III: Create a system of lifelong learning and change management for faculty, staff and college leadership. Strategy IV: Use data to drive continuous improvement in both student success and administrative efficiency. Strategy V: Treat information technology as a centrally funded, baseline service in the system budget. Five strategies for transformation

We will not try to do what others can do better, faster, and for less money. We will shift our best and brightest IT staff from software developers to integration experts who tie together best-of-breed applications. This plan also recommends a shift from locally-developed software and hosting services.

In the end, catching up with today’s information technologies is not about technology itself; it is about a new world of open, online sharing where everyone has the power to create and disseminate their ideas, courses and textbooks and to re- mix and use others’ work. But the biggest shift called for in this plan is cultural. And it will take leadership to get there…

Bottom Line Accountability  Shared technology, support services and content is a responsible use of public funds. Accessibility  All students, faculty and staff need access to enterprise eLearning & administrative systems and support services to compete in the global market. Affordability  No College can afford all necessary eLearning & administrative systems & support services individually.

What Happens if we Don’t Change? Google, Amazon, Apple, Open Source, Open Content, Open Textbooks… Higher Education Functional Possibilities Time Harder to catch-up … Or even understand.

Dr. Cable Green (360) Twitter: cgreen