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> I think the big mistake one can do when comparing digital and physical textbooks is compare then one-on-one with a level playing field. Why do that? > Digita

by mcny 9y ago

> I think the big mistake one can do when comparing digital and physical textbooks is compare then one-on-one with a level playing field. Why do that? > Digital textbooks can offer so much more than print textbooks. They can have embedded interactive content, ranging from zoomable 2D content to see something in detail to rotatable 3D models. They can have videos. They can have automatically gradable quizzes and exercises. I absolutely agree. Moreover, there might be some situations where physical books might be BETTER and some situations where a digital textbook might be better. When it comes to textbooks, our effort should be focused on books that are unencumbered by copyright and other such malaise. The goal for the future should be open education resources such as open education resources > Open educational resources (OERs) are teaching, learning, and research resources that reside in the public domain or have been released under a copyright license that permits anyone to freely use and repurpose them. Open educational resources include full courses, course materials, modules, textbooks, streaming videos, tests, journal articles, and any other tools or materials used to support learning. I am not saying CUNY's efforts are on the spot (I have no idea how far they've gotten so far tbh) but I think it is a step in the right direction http://www2.cuny.edu/libraries/open-educational-resources/ http://www2.cuny.edu/libraries/open-educational-resources/

ktta 9y ago
>When it comes to textbooks, our effort should be focused on books that are unencumbered by copyright and other such malaise. The goal for the future should be open education resources such as open education resources I have the exact same opinion. I commented right here on HN about the importance of these kinds of free resources. The CS community is leading with this, but I see other fields catching up with this too. Edit: Found my comment[1](Google is amazingly powerful and scary). Check out the textbook to see what I'm talking about with the 'rich content' argument. [1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13905438 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13905438
speedplane 9y ago
> When it comes to textbooks, our effort should be focused on books that are unencumbered by copyright and other such malaise. The cost of copyrighted textbook can be substantial, but they are usually dwarfed by the cost of the larger educational undertaking. Open access textbooks is a good goal, but I'm not sure I it as critical to improving education.
- mcny 9y ago
  > The cost of copyrighted textbook can be substantial, but they are usually dwarfed by the cost of the larger educational undertaking. Open access textbooks is a good goal, but I'm not sure I it as critical to improving education. I absolutely agree. We have to bring down the cost in higher education. I'd go as far as to say that for public institutions, we should considerably bring down the administrative cost which is not possible without removing a lot of the reporting requirement. We require our schools and colleges to do far more than just teach. There is no reason why public schools should compete against private, land grant schools by outspending on athletics and fancy dorms (no, please don't tell me these programs make more money than we put into it because it is NOT TRUE for all colleges as a whole). For public schools, it should be easy to calculate the median annual income of all teaching staff (tenured professors, non-tenured professors, associate professors, adjuncts, lecturers, graduate assistants, yada yada) and enforce that nobody not even the football coach makes more than twice that median. There are a lot of things we need to do to lower the cost, including some things that will make the unions mad at us and some things that will make the administration mad at us (basically we will make enemies all around if we want to do the right thing which is mostly why we can't do the right thing). Above, I was just talking about books. Once we remove the "intellectual property" part out of the textbooks out of the equation, we can have very cheap books that anyone can print and we can more fairly assess the cost of print vs screen.
  - speedplane 9y ago
    Definitely agree we should bring down the cost while keeping or improving academic standards, but your quick fixes are pretty naive. If all we needed to do was dock coach's salary to make a school affordable, or require open access text books, it would have been done long ago. Most professors aren't wealthy. Public schools are huge institutions, limiting their administrations power to set salaries or assign books can cause far more harm, hurt recruitment and quality. I don't have a quick fix, other than making much larger investments in education with public dollars.
  - ktta 9y ago
    Something I believe is that college tuition isn't high because maintaining a college is expensive due to the unnecessary expenditure you state. I think it is high so that the money can be used fund other, more important parts of the university. One of the primary ways a college gets 'ranked', and thereby attracts better students is by research efforts of the university. Now research needs money, from equipment to paying post docs to retaining good professors. State universities get federal grants, but is that sufficient to compete against private universities that charge $40k+ each semester? I think lack of research funding is the reason college tuition being so high. I also think driving down costs will only drive down the quality of education, since lower salaries mean less resources for research & sub-par profs (because they'll be at $TECH_COMPANY) -> lower ranking -> less 'good' students -> less research. And at some point you'd be stuck in the same situation as the public middle and secondary schools, where administration has to pinch pennies and reduce programs that benefit students. Sounds messed up, but the only way out is more funding from the state if you want a cheap college education. Or just avoid the costs and get yourself an Internet Education.

by mcny 9y ago

ktta 9y ago

>When it comes to textbooks, our effort should be focused on books that are unencumbered by copyright and other such malaise. The goal for the future should be open education resources such as open education resources I have the exact same opinion. I commented right here on HN about the importance of these kinds of free resources. The CS community is leading with this, but I see other fields catching up with this too. Edit: Found my comment[1](Google is amazingly powerful and scary). Check out the textbook to see what I'm talking about with the 'rich content' argument. [1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13905438 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13905438

speedplane 9y ago

> When it comes to textbooks, our effort should be focused on books that are unencumbered by copyright and other such malaise. The cost of copyrighted textbook can be substantial, but they are usually dwarfed by the cost of the larger educational undertaking. Open access textbooks is a good goal, but I'm not sure I it as critical to improving education.

mcny 9y ago
> The cost of copyrighted textbook can be substantial, but they are usually dwarfed by the cost of the larger educational undertaking. Open access textbooks is a good goal, but I'm not sure I it as critical to improving education. I absolutely agree. We have to bring down the cost in higher education. I'd go as far as to say that for public institutions, we should considerably bring down the administrative cost which is not possible without removing a lot of the reporting requirement. We require our schools and colleges to do far more than just teach. There is no reason why public schools should compete against private, land grant schools by outspending on athletics and fancy dorms (no, please don't tell me these programs make more money than we put into it because it is NOT TRUE for all colleges as a whole). For public schools, it should be easy to calculate the median annual income of all teaching staff (tenured professors, non-tenured professors, associate professors, adjuncts, lecturers, graduate assistants, yada yada) and enforce that nobody not even the football coach makes more than twice that median. There are a lot of things we need to do to lower the cost, including some things that will make the unions mad at us and some things that will make the administration mad at us (basically we will make enemies all around if we want to do the right thing which is mostly why we can't do the right thing). Above, I was just talking about books. Once we remove the "intellectual property" part out of the textbooks out of the equation, we can have very cheap books that anyone can print and we can more fairly assess the cost of print vs screen.
- speedplane 9y ago
  Definitely agree we should bring down the cost while keeping or improving academic standards, but your quick fixes are pretty naive. If all we needed to do was dock coach's salary to make a school affordable, or require open access text books, it would have been done long ago. Most professors aren't wealthy. Public schools are huge institutions, limiting their administrations power to set salaries or assign books can cause far more harm, hurt recruitment and quality. I don't have a quick fix, other than making much larger investments in education with public dollars.
- ktta 9y ago
  Something I believe is that college tuition isn't high because maintaining a college is expensive due to the unnecessary expenditure you state. I think it is high so that the money can be used fund other, more important parts of the university. One of the primary ways a college gets 'ranked', and thereby attracts better students is by research efforts of the university. Now research needs money, from equipment to paying post docs to retaining good professors. State universities get federal grants, but is that sufficient to compete against private universities that charge $40k+ each semester? I think lack of research funding is the reason college tuition being so high. I also think driving down costs will only drive down the quality of education, since lower salaries mean less resources for research & sub-par profs (because they'll be at $TECH_COMPANY) -> lower ranking -> less 'good' students -> less research. And at some point you'd be stuck in the same situation as the public middle and secondary schools, where administration has to pinch pennies and reduce programs that benefit students. Sounds messed up, but the only way out is more funding from the state if you want a cheap college education. Or just avoid the costs and get yourself an Internet Education.