Open Educational Resources Expand Access to Higher Education in the United States » infojustice

"Leaders in the Obama Administration, in state governments, and in corporate America have acknowledged the urgency of increasing access to higher education in the United States – particularly through community colleges.  These leaders also recognize the importance of improving completion rates and educational outcomes for those who enroll. As we come to the close of Open Education Week, it is now time for these leaders to focus attention, energy and resources on the most immediate opportunity to make progress toward these goals while also freeing up billions of dollars that can be redirected toward this progress.  Make textbooks available to students for free or at very low marginal cost. The Open Textbook Opportunity – Tidewater Community College Case Study Sound too good to be true?  It’s not, and the forward-looking folks at Tidewater Community College are leading the way.  Students at Tidewater can now save 30% of the cost of a two-year Associate’ Degree of Science in Business Administration because all of the textbooks are published under a Creative Commons Attribution license which gives anyone – students and the school – the rights to freely make copies and adapt these works as long as proper attribution to the author(s) is maintained. According to Linda Williams at Tidewater, open textbooks have not just been a cost savings but also have improved the quality of the educational experience and have opened up improvements in students’ quality of life. In one case a student – a veteran – was routinely unable to afford his textbooks until weeks into the semester.  When he enrolled in a Pre-Calculus class for which he could freely download the openly-licensed textbook, it was the first time he’d ever started a class with the required materials in hand. In another case, a single mother who enrolled in the Business Administration degree program was able to use her savings on textbooks to buy braces for her daughter – an expense she could not have managed without these cost savings ..."