"You're cutting edge!" ... A student's compliments make my day :)

A student, "K," emails me:

You're cutting edge! Found an article about a university that gives grants to profs to make their own work available for courses so students don't have to pay an arm and a leg for text books! Interesting concept, just thought I would let you know again how much I (We, if I can speak for the college student in general) appreciate the fact that you let us learn in an economically friendly way!

Very, very rarely anymore do I use books for the courses I teach.  Instead, I make use of academic journal articles that are accessible electronically through the university's library, and an array of freely available online readings, and audio and video materials.

Not only because it is wallet-friendly for students, but also--and more importantly--because using books is so much old-style, and using textbooks is nearly primitive, for the kinds of courses I teach.

But, doing what I do is hard work because I need to be constantly on the lookout for materials that I can use in my courses.  After all, it is so much easier to merely use a textbook or two.

In addition to that kind of work, I have to deal with reactionaries--the faculty, in particular.

Five years ago, the then president of the faculty union here led an effort against online course offerings.  Yes, against.

In my reply (November 11, 2006!) I wrote in support of offering more and more online courses, and went beyond that issue alone:

I would argue that course materials belong in the intellectual commons, and not behind walls that prevent access. 

Over the past few years, I have been impressed with two important approaches in particular:

1. The idea of "Creative Commons" that Lawrence Lessig champions. 

2. MIT's venture into "opencourseware".

I am not sure if it was Lessig who started Creative Commons, but it was from one of his talks a few years ago that I became aware of it.  (More info at http://creativecommons.org/) 

This approach appeals to me because I think the more we make ideas available for everybody, the more humans progress.  I don't think that all our progress has come out of material incentives alone, which is what complex intellectual property rights regimens attempt to do.

A similar, and in fact related, venture is MIT's OpenCourseWare.  (More info at http://ocw.mit.edu/index.html)

When it was launched I remember thinking, hey, this is why the Web is fantastic: we can easily makes things available for free and easy access to people wherever they might be.  This is all the more the case when it comes to distributing knowledge to people in resource-constrained countries, which are quite a few in this world.

MIT's approach has catalyzed the development of the "Opencourseware Consortium".  (More info at http://www.ocwconsortium.org/) It has now become a world-wide effort to pool together the academic knowledge.   

... 

I also hope that the union would urge the OUS campuses to join the OpenCourseware Consortium, if a campus is already not a member.

In sending that kind of a reply, I was consistent with what I always tell students: provide evidence for your arguments, and don't simply try to dazzle me with rhetoric.  

The reply from the faculty union president was nothing but hot rhetoric; a tragic irony, given that he is a philosophy professor :)

The union isn't against online courses, or intellectual commons, but you are proceeding from a false assumption.  The material posted for online courses is not part of some intellectual commons - it is owned by the University.  They charge students money for access to it.  Under the current system, if they so desired, they could get you to do an online course once, then hire an adjunct to teach your material ad infinitum and never give you the chance to teach it again.  They could forgo adding full-time tenure-track positions to your department (in fact, they do that already!), and teach classes on the cheap using your materials and perpetual adjuncts.  They could even reduce the number of tenure-track faculty, replacing them with adjuncts.  Colleges and Universities all over the country are in fact doing this.  We want the University to add full-time tenure-track faculty (with Ph.D.s) to meet student demand, and they don't want to do it because better qualified people cost more per class.

 

This isn't about intellectual commons - it is about universities being able to exploit faculty, especially adjuncts, and about ensuring the highest quality of instruction. 

Seriously, did he not see a major flaw in his own argument?  If the worry is about the university packaging up a course content and having an adjunct teach it ad infinitum, and eliminate the need for full-time faculty, then couldn't the university simply make use of the wide range of course materials, including syllabi, from  prestigious universities like MIT, which provide the same materials for free through the OperCourseWare project, instead of commissioning me to develop them? 

The net result: students, like the one who emailed me, are severely shortchanged by faculty who believe that higher education is only about them, instead of focusing on the only thing that really matters: student learning.

I suppose all I need is an email or two from students, and that is enough to make a Don Quixote out of me tilting at the academic windmills :)

Thank you, "K."

ps: the news item that "K" came across, which prompted her to email me?  This one:

the University of Massachusetts at Amherst recently launched the Open Education Initiative, which will award grants to faculty members seeking to develop low- or no-cost course materials as an alternative to traditional textbooks.

Hmmm .... I didn't even get a grant to do what I have been doing for years :)

The news item also adds this:

Librarian Marilyn Billings says the project will eventually aim to make open education resources “accessible to anyone, anywhere.” 

I wonder whether the faculty union leaders read such materials at all!

Or, perhaps those "leaders" serve as classic examples of Kahneman's "illusion of validity"