News Brief: RIC Students Save Over $1 Million in Textbook Costs!

The rising cost of traditional textbooks has left many college students without the resources they need to succeed.

According to one study, “Roughly 65% of students, on average, indicated they did not purchase a textbook because of the cost. More than half of those students felt that foregoing the textbook negatively influenced their grade in the course, and approximately 37% had dropped a course because they were unable to afford the textbook” (Fischer et al., 2020).

To ensure student success, Rhode Island College has been one of the leading higher education institutions in the state to adopt free open textbooks. Over the past seven years, open textbooks have saved RIC students an estimated $1,330,677.

Reference Librarian and Associate Professor Dragan Gill coordinates RIC’s open textbook initiative. She also leads ongoing professional development workshops to encourage faculty use of these books.

“The goals of the workshops are to make faculty aware of the financial barriers students face when purchasing textbooks and to encourage faculty to select open educational resources [OERs] as part of their course material,” she says.

OER materials consist not only of open textbooks but online materials, lab materials, videos, simulations, homework assignments. “Anything you use to teach in a classroom, there are open versions available,” Gill says. “In our workshops, we talk about these other resources.”

Gill adds that with OER materials, faculty can mix and match, customizing them to fit the way the educator wants to teach a course. Unlike traditionally copyrighted content, educators utilizing OER materials have the freedom to revise an open book’s content or add their own content, as well as the flexibility to combine open resources together.

Looking back, Gill says, “We’ve done an excellent job of supporting faculty adoption of open textbooks at Rhode Island College.”

In fact, some faculty have become interested in authoring their own open textbook.

“They do so because they want to get the best teaching and learning materials out there for students,” she says. “They’re not only contributing to open textbook availability, it’s a way for them to make good teaching and learning materials accessible.”

The first RIC faculty members to write their own open textbook were Professor Mikaila Arthur and Professor Emeritus Roger Clark, who co-authored “Social Data Analysis.” Their book is available through the Open Textbook Library.

Another RIC faculty member in the Department of Computer Science is now creating his own open textbook.

Clearly Rhode Island College is unlocking the vast potential of OER.

“I hope to continue this important work,” says Gill.