Spring 2022
Committee:
Executive Committee, Legislative Affairs Committee
WHEREAS, Open Education Resources (OER) are defined as high-quality teaching, learning, and research resources that reside in the public domain or have been released under an intellectual property license, such as a Creative Commons license [1], that permits their free use and repurposing by others, and may include other resources that are legally available and free of cost to students;
WHEREAS, the state of California and Governor Gavin Newsom have provided historic funding to date to OER and zero-cost-textbook programs for California community college students, totaling close to $115 million in 2021 alone [2]; yet despite these efforts, faculty use of OER resources has remained stagnant at 16% since 2018, with Inside Higher Ed citing, “faculty inertia...doubts about the quality of OER...and the lack of central structures...for open materials” as causing lag and delay in OER implementation [3];
WHEREAS, there currently exists no statewide OER repository where campuses and faculty can reliably access high-quality open educational resources for use in their courses, causing professors and deans to put in extra work and time when choosing to switch to OER material, decreasing the overall number of faculty members who choose OER; and
WHEREAS, the Academic Senate for California Community Colleges in resolution 03.05 (2021) [4] cited confusion and misunderstanding in California Education Code §78052.5, which redefines “zero-textbook-cost degrees” to allow for “low-cost” to be recognized as “zero” in certain instances [5], in weariness of faculty to use OER, and such language creates undue surprises for students making enrollment decisions based on the “zero-cost” labeling; now, therefore, be it
RESOLVED, that the Student Senate for California Community Colleges advocate for the establishment of the creation of a task force/workgroup of past and present faculty members who will work to compile high- quality OER resources into course-ready material and to aggregate said resources in one easily accessible online repository for California Community College use;
RESOLVED, that the Student Senate for California Community Colleges advocate for the creation of a public platform similar to that of commercially copyrighted materials and publishing companies like McGraw- Hill, Pearson, and Cengage to compete with high cost “all-in-one" materials that are increasing in use every year; and
RESOLVED, that the Student Senate of California Community Colleges advocate for the creation of a verification process for zero-cost-textbook pathways, courses, and materials, to ensure the textbook cost of said pathways, courses, and materials are indeed zero.
Citation 1: Doug Lederman, Awareness of Open Educational Resources Grows, but Adoption Doesn’t, Inside Higher Ed, 2021, https://www.insidehighered.com/digital-learning/article/2021/03/18/pandemic-didnt-speed-adoption-open- educational-resources-outlook?utm_source=pocket_mylist
Citation 2: James Glapa-Crossklag, Great News from California: The Right Time for ZTC and OER, CCCOER,https://www.cccoer.org/2021/08/20/great-news-from-california/
Citation 3: See 1
Citation 4: ASCCC resolution: 03.5, Zero Means Zero Textbook Cost, https://www.asccc.org/resolutions/zero-means-zero-textbook-cost
Citation 5: Zero-Textbook-Cost Degree Grant Program, Article. 4 EDC, https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/codes_displayText.xhtml?lawCode=EDC&division=7.&title=3.&part=48.&chapter
=1.&article=4.
WHEREAS, the state of California and Governor Gavin Newsom have provided historic funding to date to OER and zero-cost-textbook programs for California community college students, totaling close to $115 million in 2021 alone [2]; yet despite these efforts, faculty use of OER resources has remained stagnant at 16% since 2018, with Inside Higher Ed citing, “faculty inertia...doubts about the quality of OER...and the lack of central structures...for open materials” as causing lag and delay in OER implementation [3];
WHEREAS, there currently exists no statewide OER repository where campuses and faculty can reliably access high-quality open educational resources for use in their courses, causing professors and deans to put in extra work and time when choosing to switch to OER material, decreasing the overall number of faculty members who choose OER; and
WHEREAS, the Academic Senate for California Community Colleges in resolution 03.05 (2021) [4] cited confusion and misunderstanding in California Education Code §78052.5, which redefines “zero-textbook-cost degrees” to allow for “low-cost” to be recognized as “zero” in certain instances [5], in weariness of faculty to use OER, and such language creates undue surprises for students making enrollment decisions based on the “zero-cost” labeling; now, therefore, be it
RESOLVED, that the Student Senate for California Community Colleges advocate for the establishment of the creation of a task force/workgroup of past and present faculty members who will work to compile high- quality OER resources into course-ready material and to aggregate said resources in one easily accessible online repository for California Community College use;
RESOLVED, that the Student Senate for California Community Colleges advocate for the creation of a public platform similar to that of commercially copyrighted materials and publishing companies like McGraw- Hill, Pearson, and Cengage to compete with high cost “all-in-one" materials that are increasing in use every year; and
RESOLVED, that the Student Senate of California Community Colleges advocate for the creation of a verification process for zero-cost-textbook pathways, courses, and materials, to ensure the textbook cost of said pathways, courses, and materials are indeed zero.
Citation 1: Doug Lederman, Awareness of Open Educational Resources Grows, but Adoption Doesn’t, Inside Higher Ed, 2021, https://www.insidehighered.com/digital-learning/article/2021/03/18/pandemic-didnt-speed-adoption-open- educational-resources-outlook?utm_source=pocket_mylist
Citation 2: James Glapa-Crossklag, Great News from California: The Right Time for ZTC and OER, CCCOER,https://www.cccoer.org/2021/08/20/great-news-from-california/
Citation 3: See 1
Citation 4: ASCCC resolution: 03.5, Zero Means Zero Textbook Cost, https://www.asccc.org/resolutions/zero-means-zero-textbook-cost
Citation 5: Zero-Textbook-Cost Degree Grant Program, Article. 4 EDC, https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/codes_displayText.xhtml?lawCode=EDC&division=7.&title=3.&part=48.&chapter
=1.&article=4.