Developing an OER textbook is difficult. I am not sure how it can be done without dedicated protected time! Tonight, I watched a session from Open Ed 2021 entitled “Development and Sustainability of an OER Textbook” by Ann Diker, Professor at Metropolitan State University of Denver. Diker’s original plan was to find an OER to adapt for their introduction to nutrition course. Diker gathered input from ten faculty through a survey. The perceived benefits that were identified by faculty were access and ease of updating, and the concerns were misinformation. Faculty ranked topics from a textbook on importance. What a thorough job Diker did to obtain information before starting this project! Diker made a list of topics based on this information that would need to be included in an ideal textbook for their course. The last element of the survey proved to be useful: a question asked whether faculty would be interested in reviewing an OER! During the development stage, Diker created a spreadsheet to track OER options and databases. The spreadsheet included notes on when information was updated. At the end of a month, Diker narrowed down the options to three texts. Diker estimates spending eighty hours reviewing these options! The preferred option still needed revision and updates. A graduate student reviewed the content too. Diker warned that it takes a lot of time and advised: “be kind to yourself.” They mentioned that every chapter took about 20 hours during one summer. They launched in fall 2020. They used the Libre Texts (.org) platform. I wonder if one day I could do something like this! There are fourteen chapters in the book and sections for each chapter. The page they showed had text, learning objectives, key takeaways, embedded YouTube videos, and side navigation. The impact of this OER was evaluated using the percent of DFW in the course. The DFW rate for the course was about 30% and with the launch of the OER went down to 26%. Interestingly, the withdrawal rate declined with the introduction of the OER. However, as Diker noted, the higher withdrawal rate in 2020 may have been due to the pandemic. There has also been a significant increase in the As earned in this course. While the data is preliminary, it is encouraging and further supported by qualitative data from faculty and students. Student feedback was encouraging, and gender-neutral language was included. Diker shared a table of language that was improved. They also clarified the terms sex and gender. I thought that part of the presentation was really interesting, though I would need additional examples from the text to understand the changes. Diker also described how four months after the lunch, they were able to quickly update the new dietary guidelines from 2020. Diker described sustainability in terms of a commitment to updating and addressing cultural sensitivity and accessibility. Their example was the inclusion of different foods. The next challenge that Diker had was evaluating the readability and reading levels of the assignment guidelines. This was done by a graduate student submitting the text to a readability “checker” online. What a neat idea! Also, contributors can be added to individual pages of the textbook, allowing collaboration and integration of diverse experts. Diker’s key takeaways were that developing an OER is a process and requires collaboration for sustainability. The topic may be different from what I usually teach, but the message was clear: developing an OER is hard work but also a rewarding opportunity to collaborate with experts, mentees, and scholars.
