Internet2 and EDUCAUSE Partner To Deliver eText Pilot At Colleges and Universities Nationwide, Fall 2012

McGraw-Hill Education, Courseload and 25 higher education institutions test new approaches to making electronic textbooks and other learning materials more affordable through new business model

WASHINGTON & ANN ARBOR, Mich.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--EDUCAUSE and Internet2 announced a series of pilot efforts to evaluate technologies and business models in the fast evolving migration from traditional textbooks to digital learning materials. For the fall 2012 term, the pilot is being conducted in partnership with McGraw-Hill Education and Courseload, through which more than 25 colleges and universities will provide eTexts to their students.

“the main benefits have been for the students, who […] can have their texts on the various machines they carry around with them all the time.”

Including educational institutions across the spectrum from major research institutions to community colleges, this pilot aims to advance a new model for the purchase, distribution, and use of electronic textbooks and digital course materials. Participating colleges and universities are listed at the end of this announcement.

The pilot departs from current eText practices in three key ways:

1. Replaces individual purchases by students with site licenses negotiated and funded by campuses;

2. Substitutes paper textbooks owned by students with electronic materials licensed for use in specific classes; and

3. Uses an e-reader not associated with a specific publisher.

Based on the pilot, EDUCAUSE, Internet2, and the participating institutions will assess the new model for appeal and pedagogical benefit to faculty and students, scalability of the approach, ease of integration with campus learning management environment, and especially how the model supports increased value and lower costs of educational materials. The pilot will help higher education progress toward adoption of more cost-effective procurement of electronic class materials, which are in turn much less expensive than their print predecessors.

Students in participating courses will use McGraw-Hill Education eTexts and digital learning material selected by faculty, as well as the Courseload reader and annotation software, which allows content to be delivered directly through their school’s existing learning management system (LMS).

Students will receive their eTexts at no cost as the institutions are subsidizing the study. The e-reader will enable students and instructors to access, highlight, and annotate their eTexts and learning materials on almost any Internet-enabled device, even when they are not connected to the Internet. Students who want a printed copy may print portions of their eText directly, or may order a print-on-demand version of the eText for a fee.

The fall 2012 pilot expands upon a more limited experiment involving the University of California at Berkeley, Cornell University, the University of Minnesota, the University of Virginia, and the University of Wisconsin at Madison, and a successful earlier effort at Indiana University. These initial efforts demonstrated the appeal of the new model -- more than 100,000 online pages read, with almost none printed--with balanced reactions from students or instructors. Feedback also indicated that in addition to the substantial cost savings the approach represents, those involved appreciated the ability to digitally annotate content and share those annotations while using less paper.

As a faculty participant at the University of Virginia said, “the main benefits have been for the students, who […] can have their texts on the various machines they carry around with them all the time.” The initial efforts also underscored important goals for future efforts, such as ensuring that eTexts are accessible to students with special needs and others requiring special accommodation.

“Our core mission,” said Greg Jackson, vice president of EDUCAUSE and former chief information officer at the University of Chicago, “is to advance higher education through the use of information technology. This pilot will help us understand how the advent of appealing, affordable eTexts can enable fundamental changes in the relationships among students, instructors, campuses, and publishers, and thereby address a major obstacle to college affordability.”

“More and more universities are eager to explore new approaches to delivering content to students. These pilot programs offer an alternative to the legacy textbook model to which students and campuses are anxious to find alternatives as eTexts become mainstream,” said Shel Waggener, senior vice president of Internet2 and former chief information officer at UC Berkeley. “We continue to invite other publishers and e-reader platform providers to join our efforts to explore new models for improving the delivery and use of electronic content so that everyone benefits.”

“We're in the midst of a digital transformation in higher education, as more and more institutions, instructors, and students recognize the power of technology in the classroom,” said Tom Malek, vice president of Learning Solutions and Services for McGraw-Hill Higher Education. “We are excited to partner with Internet2, EDUCAUSE, and the institutions to explore new ways of delivering our world-class content and transformative digital learning tools to all students at a fair price and through campuses’ existing infrastructure.”

“We are delighted to continue our collaboration with the higher-education community,” said Mickey Levitan, CEO of Courseload, “and we very much appreciate that EDUCAUSE and Internet2 have encouraged a broader array of institutions to experiment with new models and share their experiences and outcomes.”

List of participants, as of Sept. 4, 2012:

• Baylor University
• California State Polytechnic University, Pomona
• Colorado State University
• Cornell University
• Dartmouth College
• Iowa State University of Science and Technology
• Madison Area Technical College
• Miami University
• Michigan State University
• Middlebury College
• Northern Kentucky University
• Southern Illinois University, Edwardsville
• Stony Brook University
• University at Buffalo, The State University of New York
• University of Alaska
• University of California, Berkeley
• University of Hawaii
• University of Iowa
• University of Kentucky
• University of South Florida
• University of Virginia
• University of Wisconsin, Madison
• Vermont State Colleges
• Virginia Tech
• Wichita State University

Pilot leaders will speak about the eText pilot at the Fall 2012 Internet2 Member Meeting in October and the EDUCAUSE 2012 Annual Conference in November.