Our Journey, Day 59

Yesterday I had breakfast with my son, then I presented two talks, the first on Textbook Affordability and the second on Z-Degrees. Then I jumped back in my car and drove about six hours (with a couple of stops) back home to northern Minnesota. I thought the presentations went pretty well. If the videos came out, I'll post them. If not, I'll probably re-record them. I spent a bit more time than I usually do, talking about my own experience and the projects I've done. I think that made it somewhat less daunting to think about incorporating OER in a class to reduce student expense. It can happen in organic stages and it can be part of whatever else a teacher is doing to improve their classes.

There were also a few questions about whether and how I had incorporated accessibility features, which I had mentioned in my talk. Although these questions were not designed to derail the conversation about instructors considering adopting or making OER, they were asked by people coming from a more instructional design background than teachers thinking about their content. I don't think this was a problem, but I do think it's important not to put the cart (accessibility, cultural inclusion, etc.) before the horse (reduced cost, increased flexibility). And it's definitely an area where the system office could provide resources (especially Instructional Designers) who could help.

I listened to a big chunk of Adler and Van Doren's How to Read a Book on the way, and then a section of Jaron Lanier's Who Owns the Future. Actually, it was the part about Higher Ed. I really like Lanier, but I think sometimes he can be a bit snarky and dismissive; and even when he's not doing that he isn't always that clear about connecting point A with points B and C, and so on to Z. So I'll probably return to that and respond, once I've reread that section and thought it through. He does see some issues much more clearly than many other commentators, which is an interesting trick to be able to pull off when you're embedded as deeply into the systems you critique as he has been throughout his career.

While I was away from Bemidji, the faculty and the Deans met to discuss the Deans' emergency reorganization plan. Although the members of my union are apparently reacting to the proposal as if it dropped directly from outer space, as I talk to people outside BSU it seems these types of moves (consolidating colleges and collapsing the burden of Department Chair release time and duty days by combining departments) have been made with some success at other schools, even within our system. As I've been saying pretty much since this retrenchment journey began, I think it's completely symptomatic of the crisis in Higher Ed right now. So it seems reasonable to begin working on solutions before the problems reach an existential pitch. I wonder how things might have been different, if the administration and faculty had spent the giant chunk of the last five years they put into rebranding the "Liberal Education" goals as "Core Curriculum", on these issues.