William Troost - Economics

1) What drove you to make the decision to switch to OERs?

I have found over the years that publisher sold textbooks rarely change in a demonstrable way. I told my students a story about how I had worked as a TA for an Economics course that used a textbook. When starting at VIU nearly 10 years later, our classes used the same textbook but three editions later. I keep all my textbooks, so I went back through and compared the two of them. I found that all the chapter titles and orders were identical and so was about 95% of the text. Despite this, the bookstore was selling the text for over $150. Since then, the texts have not changed and despite going digital the prizes of textbooks has risen even more.

I found that the high prices were preventing students from purchasing the text and not using this valuable resource. The open resource text I found is nearly as good as the publisher provided one and is free for students to use. I realized that it would be valuable to provide this free option to the students to eliminate one hurdle to getting a great education.

2) What was the biggest hurdle you overcame?

There weren't many for me personally. Going through the text and assigning new chapters to my course outline was the only hurdle I can think of. For some professors losing the bank of questions and pre-made lecture slides could be a large hurdle. I like to craft my own personal slide presentations and questions so a loss of these didn't hurt me. However, for some professors I could see this entailing a lot of work to make the change.

3) Where did you find the most support?

My students have been very appreciative. When contemplating the move I consulted with my wife and she agreed that the cost of textbooks is ridiculous and this was a good idea.

4) Do you have any further thoughts about OERs since making the switch?

Moving forward I would love to aid in enriching the texts and adding content. It would be great if faculty could work together in producing even better OERs. I have a strong interest in Economic history and it would be great if a text could capture some of this and be used to illustrate points and add context.