Ebooks Day at UTPA

August 23, 2010

Informational Sessions



 Computer Center Room 1.734

9:30-10:20

Using Digital Content through Café Scribe for Higher Education

Presenter: Bill Boney

10:30-11:20

Using WileyPLUS for teaching effectiveness and student success

Presenter: Dr. Rob Eby

1:30-2:20

Alternate Content Delivery and Teaching Tools

Presenter: Robert St. John

Pearson Learning Solutions

Training Session



Computer Center Room 1.738

1:30-2:20

WileyPLUS Training

Trainer: Dr. Rob Eby

We're just a few weeks into the Fall semester, the first student surveys in The eBooks Project have been taken, and we're settling into the weekly rhythm of watching the project unfold. At mid-term the second round of surveys will be given to the students.

Soon, we'll be visiting with faculty all over campus to identify professors who want to participate in the Spring 2010 eBooks Project. You already know that because this is an experimental project, we're partnering with a single book publisher: Wiley & Sons. Faculty who participate must teach using one of the texts in the online WileyPLUS program. A link to the complete listing of all texts can be found here.

As was the case this fall, we have 500 seats available. It'll be really interesting to see if we fill to capacity as quickly for Spring as we did for the Fall. Keep watching this space–I'll post dates and times for the meetings as soon as we set them.

The following classes are participating in the Fall 2009 phase of The eBooks Project

• Abnormal Psychology PSY 4313.02
• Statistical Methods QUMT 3343.01
• Statistical Methods QUMT 3343.02
• Statistical Methods QUMT 3343.03
• Statistical Methods QUMT 3343.04
• Statistical Methods QUMT 3343.05
• Statistical Methods QUMT 3343.06
• Statistical Methods QUMT 3343.07
• Statistical Methods QUMT 3343.08

The eBooks Project is now officially live!

The eBooks packets have been delivered to the UTPA Bookstore. If you're a student enrolled in one of the classes participating in the Fall 2009 eBooks Project, you've already received an email notifying you that you're part of the Project and that you don't have to pay for a textbook in that class.

If you are enrolled in a class participating in The eBooks Project, just present your UTPA ID to the checkout counter in the University Bookstore and you will be given a packet of information telling you how to access your electronic textbook.

I'm glad for the opportunity to help reduce the cost of education for the 500 students in the Fall Cohort, but the chance to be a part of something that may end up helping us understand what role electronic books can have in higher education is what's really exciting to me.

I'ved already had firm indications of interest from three areas for participation in the eBooks Project for Spring 2010. As noted earlier in this blog, Fall is completely full (actually slightly over capacity). If you are interested in taking part in this unique opportunity to use eBooks in your classes, while advancing the body of knowledge about student outcomes when they use eBooks, leave a comment in this blog or send me an email.

You notice the careful wording "officially full" in the headline. Actually, we are 20 over our stated goal of 500 students. So the Fall cohort is now closed, with a population of 520 students. Now comes the job of notifying the students signing up for those classes that they don't have to buy a textbook this Fall.

Erika Flores – Assistant

Erika is currently employed with the Division of Information Technology, where she assists on communications for The eBooks Project. She graduated from UTPA in the Fall of 2008, with a Bachelors in Political Science and English, and she is now in the process of pursuing a Masters in English. As soon as she receives her graduate degree she intends to enroll in law school and specialize either in international or immigration law.    

As of today, 490 out of 500 seats are full in the Fall 2009 cohort of The eBooks Project.

This is amazing to me because when we first started The eBooks Project one of my biggest worries was whether we would be able to interest people in participating. Now we have only 10 seats remaining which I suppose means Fall 2009 is effectively full.

But what about those 10 vacant seats? They'd be perfect for small graduate classes or single-student "by arrangement" seminars." If you are interested in getting involved, we'll provide free e-textbooks for you and your students. You, in turn, get to help add to the body of knowledge about student learning outcomes when eBooks are involved.

If you're interested, please leave a comment or email me.

The ITPC is UTPA's technology planning council. Their meetings are where the technology decision-makers from all corners of the University get together to listen, debate, and advise on key technological directions for the campus. It was my first chance to present The eBooks Project to this group.

The presentation went well but when I came to the a slide claiming that using eBooks was a way to lower faculty workloads. That assertion was challenged by one of the members who wanted me to be a bit more specific, I almost answered that replacing paper processes with online ones reduces workload.

But I didn't say that, and I'm glad I didn't because it made me think about what we're really asking people to do–changing well-established practices and patterns is always a lot of work. It's work for the faculty and it's work for the students. It's only after you get past the initial adaptation period that you start seeing the benefits of doing those same things electronically. 

This is not even mentioning the kinds of things that are only possible in the online world, such as shared whiteboards where students can annotate their textbooks and the instructor can see what they've written. A computer makes it easier to give the same quiz to every student, but have the questions appear in a different order on each test…and have the quizzes automatically scored and their grades filed as soon as the student hands the paper in. It's easy to see the work-saving proposition when you think about those aspects of e-textbooks.

So now I think I have to go back and make some changes to my presentation.

The eBooks Project welcomes the Information Technology Planning Council. This blog is the Project's front door. Here's people can post questions and comments, read the diary of what's happening in the project, and view the official documents.

I hope you enjoy your visit. Please come back often!