Ohio textbook affordability initiative update

Later this week there will be a webinar providing an e-textbook update on the Ohio Digital Bookshelf Project as part of the state's textbook affordability initiative. Steve Acker from OhioLink will be the presenter. Here is a summary of the webinar:

In Year 1 of the Ohio Digital Bookshelf Project, five major publishers made their Introductory Psychology textbook available in digital form at a discount from print of 70%. In Year 2, the disciplines of Accounting, Biology, and Economics will be added and aggressive efforts to bring more librarians, instructional designers, and accessibility experts into the community will be undertaken.

The three strands of the Ohio Digital Bookshelf Project’s "DNA" are (1) working with traditional textbook publishers, (2) engaging in open educational resources initiatives, and (3) supporting digital literacy workshops and programs for both faculty and students reaching toward “personalized learning environments.” Each of these strands is connected and will interoperate as the learning materials environment evolves over the next five years. Traditional publishers will adapt to the OER movement, which will continue to change as an alternative to current practices. Faculty and students will continue to develop “personalized learning environments” for collecting, packaging and using content to serve individualized learning needs.

To register or learn more, go to www.teachuohio.org

University of Cincinnati and OhioLink research student textbook preferences

An article from Campus Technology discusses a research project to understand student textbook preferences that is being conducted by Charles Ginn, a field service assistant professor from the University of Cincinnati, and Stephen Acker, research director of OhioLINK’s eText Project. The project recently gave 2,000 students, which were enrolled in 14 sections of an introductory psychology course, the opportunity to purchase either a new print textbook or a cheaper e-textbook. The students involved in the study included those of traditional age (18 to 24) and non-traditional age as well as students taking the course in the classroom and online. The results showed that 22 percent of the students purchased the e-textbook and 41 percent of those students said that they preferred the e-textbook to a traditional textbook. Traditional aged college students were also 1.73 times more likely to purchase the e-textbook than students that were 24 years or older.

According to Charles Ginn, the goal of the project is to work with publishers and college stores to provide students with the option to choose between textbooks and e-textbooks. The initiative conducted for the introductory psychology course will be used as a model for other courses.

CourseSmart-USO agreement

For those looking for more information on the recent CourseSmart-USO agreement, to understand the terms and conditions, a copy of the agreement is now publicly available in pdf format. The agreement spells out a number of points, but leaves some open questions for college stores operating in the State of Ohio.

University System of Ohio and CourseSmart

There have been a few items in the press this week about a new arrangement between the University System of Ohio (USO) and CourseSmart (CS). Here are links to a few of the stories and press releases:

• USO press release
• USO FAQs on Discounted eTextbooks for Students
• USO Textbook portal, which includes a list of pros and cons of digital texts for students
• Inside Higher Ed article (Tue, Aug 26)
• Columbus Dispatch article (Weds, Aug 27)
• The Plain Dealer article (Thu, Aug 28)

Apparently the timetable for this announcement was pushed up a bit after leaks to the media resulted in some of the above pieces. So what does this mean for stores? Well, it is a little complicated. In addition to the above articles we have been talking to some of the different parties involved to understand the arrangement and its implications. Here are some of the pieces of information:

• As discussed with USO and CS earlier this year, there is opportunity and capability for stores to handle the transaction. CS is willing to negotiate a few points with stores to cover transaction costs (such as credit card interchange fees). Stores can set their own price for the materials sold through their store. USO itself will not receive revenue from the textbooks sold.
• OhioLINK can authenticate, by IP address, where a student is coming from (i.e., which campus). Thus, stores that choose to participate will have transactions from those campuses routed through their store. For example, a student from University "X" would be recognized by their IP address, and would be presented an option to buy the digital version of the textbook from their college store with no option to buy it from USO directly or elsewhere. Students from that institution would then pay the price set by that college store or university. This arrangement is necessary due to legal contractual obligations present on some campuses.
• This arrangement applies to all colleges and universities in the state of Ohio that belong to OhioLINK (which I understand is pretty much all institutions except for a handful of smaller schools).

For stores and institutions (public and private), this takes some control away from what are normally local decisions around content, format, price, and vendor selection. It also presumes that faculty and students will choose cost over options that best fit their pedagogical or learning styles. As the recent PIRG study notes, digital does not necessarily mean reduced cost for students either, particularly when printing and other total cost of ownership factors are added up. Stores do have an opportunity to participate and maintain ownership of the transaction -- allowing them to continue as the key authentication source for course content on a campus. By maintaining the transaction at the store level it allows students to pay for content in forms other than credit card, such as cash, finiancial aid, or campus-based accounts (where permitted). However, it also makes store margins visible, potentially resulting in negative press even if those margins are set at only a cost-recovery level. For the off-campus stores, (aka private stores), it is not clear whether or not they will have an option to participate in this model under the same terms.

This arrangement has implications beyond Ohio. Other states might choose to pursue similar models for gaining access to digital course materials. The implications of a state entity selecting a vendor and terms for both public and private institutions is troublesome. While the motive of reducing costs of textbooks to students is laudable, digital is not necessarily the solution at this time. It is important to offer choice, and convenience. And stores should be offering students digital options. If we do not, someone else will and on terms where we may have little input or control relative to the vendor or margins. At the same time, institutions will need to understand that providing students with lower cost textbook options may result in lower revenues from the college store. That in turn means fewer resources coming in to support student activities or other campus functions to which college store revenue contributes.

Another important aspect of this change is how quickly it occured. In a matter of months this went from a discussion of possiblities, to a completed arrangement that affects nearly 200 institutions of higher education, and an even a greater number of college stores if we add private, off-campus stores to the accounting. That is a significant change in short order. Stores that have held off considering digital because they see it as years away might want to rethink that position.

Of course, all of this concern may be moot, as many students will likely be unaware of the option to buy digital, and of those who are aware, only a fraction will choose to purchase course materials in a digital format even at the lower up-front price. Perhaps it is just another signal that digital options are maturing and that stores must take steps to control their role or involvement in the future of course materials, or risk having future decisions made for them. Like paperbacks and used books before them, electronic textbooks, as an option for students, look like they are now here to stay.

News from OhioLINK's eText program

I do not recall off-hand if I have posted information on OhioLINK's eText program previously, but this is an initiative to watch. The eText Project is similar to California State University's Digital Marketplace, which emphasizes affordability, accessibility and choice for students. The OhioLINK program is focused on affordability and the affect on student outcomes.

OhioLINK's initiative has been very interesting. I have not found a good weblink with more information about the program, although here is a link to a related news story. We have been in discussions with their program leaders since first becoming aware of the initiative over a year ago. However, things have been heating up lately, with pressure from Chancellor Fingerhut's office and new pending legislation that would mandate e-books at colleges and universities across Ohio. The first such legislation we are aware of to date.

Using an experimental design, Ohio's first semester pilots demonstrated no difference in student classroom outcomes based on the use of digital or print course materials. The digital materials appear to be less expensive, but the model looks more like digital rental than digital ownership. With successful first round pilots completed, and more underway, Ohio moves ahead of California in terms of providing a digital content solution for the higher education classroom environment. So, as Ohio goes, so too may go the rest of the country, as many states are certainly watching this initiative very closely, as are we.

There will be a symposium in a few weeks (Apr 29th) held in Columbus where OhioLINK and the Chancellor's plans will be discussed in greater detail. Several college stores and NACS have been invited to attend and participate. There does appear to be genuine interest in having the stores be part of the final solution. That, of course, requires stores to step up to the plate, and quickly. Several stores have already done so, and this initiative will affect nearly all college stores operating in the state of Ohio over the next few years -- whether public, private or contract managed.

More news and information on this topic will appear in future postings.