Pasadena City College Student Scholars Top Users in U.S. of Free Textbook Platform

Pasadena City College students are the top users in the entire country of a free online textbook resource called OpenStax. At PCC, over 46,000 students are using a free OpenStax textbook instead of the print editions, leading to an estimated savings of $4.2 million. OpenStax, a nonprofit based at Rice University in Texas, said PCC topped the list of schools nationwide where students take advantage of the free textbook technology for the 2017-2018 academic year. OpenStax textbooks are in use at 48 percent of colleges and universities in the U.S....

California professors have been working on these free e-textbooks for a while.

They work in large groups, grouped by discipline (topic). It's a voluntary effort. Anyone can join. I've been active on some of the development committees. Whoever "shows up" from CA colleges and universities joins the discussion and provides input.

While the idea of reduced-cost or free textbooks for students sounds noble and appealing, these "collective" writing efforts can have a political bias. That is the obvious danger. There is usually one "free" text per topic, such as Macroeconomics, so it is a monopoly product. No alternative free texts offering different perspectives are provided to students, right now.

Just be aware of this - it is especially concerning in social science subjects, like mine (Economics), as well as for world history and US history, political science, etc. Even physical and earth science "free" texts can harbor political bias (e.g., man-made global warming).

IOW, 'You get what you pay for' still holds... Yes, textbooks are enormously expensive. $100-$200 each and up. But -- there ARE ways an instructor can "diversify" the student's reading list so they become critical thinkers, at a low cost -- for ex., the Mises Institute has free downloads of classic Austrian works students can be assigned, etc.

I'd encourage conservative professors, both adjunct and full-time, at colleges & universities to get involved in these online text collaborations and provide strong input. Or, start your OWN group - and develop an alternative open-source text offering conservative viewpoints & perspectives.

I for one, appreciate online collaborations. Were it not for stumbling upon the Gutenberg Project some years ago, I'd have never read the original ship logs of Capt. Cook. I think they've been modified since for PC, but reading what he and his crew saw, first hand, day to day, in sometimes brutal honesty was an amazing experience.

What really caught my eye at the textbook site were the math sciences. An opportunity for smart kids to access college level math, for the highschool dropout to bootstrap themselves and for the elderly to challenge their minds again. Free. From their couches. Equally amazing.

Besides the potential feeding of politically biased books in some subjects, as other posters have mentioned, I wonder about the future of textbooks as more of them move to a free model. In the sciences, textbooks must be updated to incorporate new knowledge and understanding; what is the incentive for authors and publishers if the textbooks are free?

Bias? Do ya think?

U.S. History covers key forces that form the American experience,with particular attention to issues of race, class, and gender

I learned long ago that "unbiased" is a myth. It goes against human nature.
One of the greatest propagandists in history was Benjamin Franklin.He created completely "fake news" about colonials starving and their children dying and forged the bylines from reputable American newspapers to convince the English not to seek reparations for the war.

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.