Survey of faculty views of technology explores online teaching, OER, assessment

"A solid majority of faculty members (70 percent) also join campus administrators in endorsing one increasingly popular solution to the textbook price problem: open educational resources (OER), the freely accessible and openly licensed digital curricular materials that many institutions, states and foundations are embracing. Some institutions, especially community colleges, are trying to build entire degree programs on OER materials, with the goal of driving down nontuition costs and spurring degree completion by reducing the number of students who forgo buying their course materials.

But the most recent data on faculty usage of OER, published last winter by the Babson Survey Research Group, showed both significant growth but modest overall usage of OER textbooks, with the proportion of instructors adopting open textbooks rising to 9 percent in 2016-17 from 5 percent in 2015-16. (A new version of the group's study is due in the coming weeks.)

The survey offers some insights into why professors' philosophical embrace of lower textbook costs and of OER as a solution has yet to translate into widespread adoption. Two words: quality and control.

Less than a third of professors (32 percent) agree that "faculty members and institutions should be open to changing textbooks or other materials to save students money, even if the lower cost options are of lesser quality." Roughly half (49 percent) disagree.

And just one in five (21 percent) endorse the statement that "the need to help students save money on textbooks justifies some loss of faculty member control over selection of materials for the courses they teach." A full 60 percent disagree...."