In thinking about writing my response to topic three I was going to mention how much my textbooks were going to cost for the fall semester. However, thankfully for my bank account I do not need those multiple ridiculously expensive books, I only need one. In the article A Guide to Making Open Textbooks with Students, they say “If we think of ourselves as responsible for making sure everyone can come to our course table to learn, we will find ourselves concerned with the many other expenses students face in paying for college” (Mays, 2017). And, “what other access issues do students face as they face these economic challenges. Will they be able to read their chemistry textbook with their vision impairment? Will their LMS site list them by their birth name rather than their chosen name…” (Mays, 2017)? All of this is included in the imperative considerations a teacher must conduct. Now, to be fully transparent I initially liked to stay on the side of the typical textbook. The feeling of a book, having it to be yours to markup as needed, and being able to take it anywhere without the concerns of connectivity. Yet, throughout this class and during this week’s reading my preferences have begun to change due to the basically limitless potentialities of open educational resources. Really, they provide bidirectional learning as “knowledge consumption and knowledge creation are not separate but parallel processes, as knowledge is co-constructed, contextualized, cumulative, iterative, and recursive” (Mays, 2017).
On the other hand, the second reading this week Digital Redlining and Access introduces the world of hidden information, or something that has been redlined. Have you ever been searching for something and found nothing exists? If that’s the case, it could be redlined information from within the institution you are at. “Digital redlining is not a renaming of the digital divide. It is a different thing, a set of education policies, investment decisions, and IT practices that actively create and maintain class boundaries” (Gilliard, 2016). I found this article to provide an interesting contrast to open education resources as this system reveals information but puts up strong walls, blockades, and re-directs to push the reader to something approved by the institution. Thankfully, to my knowledge, I have not been affected by this in my own searches within the University.
Hi LLeist, thank you for sharing your perspectives,
For a long time I rallied and raved against the high price of textbooks and tuition costs of universities and got a lot of pushback from folks who argued that it was all a fair price to pay for higher education. I am glad that the dialogue is changing and that more people in higher education are discussing ways to make college and university more affordable and accessible rather that sticking to a very capitalistic view of education, one centred on providing students with the least amount of quality education for the most amount of money. On the subject of digital redlining, it is so concerning to know the ways in which student’s access to information is filtered and restricted. I can understand the reasons why Netflix or YouTube applies filters to appeal to consumer interests but when institutions restrict access to research and information that is widely made available to other universities, it becomes a very serious problem. I hope that, in time, this issue becomes corrected but for now many places of higher learning are limited to their own collections as well as their access to databases, which creates an information bubble that students are unfortunately and unfairly confined to.
Hi, Linnea, thank you for sharing your ideas with us! I totally agree with you that textbooks are expensive, and I also hope that I don’t need to purchase all of the textbook for my courses in fall. As I comment in Klaudia, for me, as an international students, only one course will cost us $2000, so that some times makes International students’ life harder, and with all these websites and textbooks for each courses, it sometimes makes them to register less course in each term. I also agree with the idea that teachers should help their students to have higher ability to attend and success.
Hi LLeist,
There are many challenges that students might face besides the high cost of textbooks, and it’s good to see that institutions and instructors in higher education are considering other ways how to make education more accessible and affordable for everyone. While I was completing my studies in Hungary, although we had to purchase textbooks, pay for accommodation, food and travel to the university, we also got paid from the university according to our marks. So we were motivated to do well in our courses. We didn’t have to pay for tuition but living expenses. I quite liked that system because when I graduated, I didn’t have to start my life in debt. After arriving to Canada, I learnt about the high tuition fees and the cost of living that made me consider going back to study but it was still a good choice.