This July, in Chaska, Minnesota, six Private Academic Library Network of Indiana (PALNI) System Leaders spent a week at the Open Textbook Network (OTN) Summer Institute and Summit.
The conference provided PALNI’s official introduction to the Open Textbook Network, which PALNI joined this summer.
The System Leaders closely explored OTN’s method of introducing the Open Textbook Library to educators via workshops, the faculty perspective, and the process of building and sustaining program momentum. They also examined the obstacles, both perceived and actual, to adopting Open Educational Resources (OER) in higher education. OERs are openly licensed educational materials like textbooks customizable by faculty, and available free to students.
The PALSave System Leaders are:
Andrea Cohn, Coordinator, Teaching and Learning Services for University of Saint Francis
Amanda Hurford, Scholarly Communications Director for PALNI
Erin Milanese, Head of Learning Technologies for Goshen College
Heather Myers, Public Services Librarian for Anderson University
Jennifer Raye, Scholarly Communication Librarian, Butler University
Dr. Tim Ziebarth, Executive Dean, The School of Professional and Online Education for Grace College and Seminary
PALNI’s OTN membership and attendance at the Summer Institute and Summit are instrumental in the new PALSave: PALNI Affordable Learning program, a collaboration of PALNI’s Scholarly Communication and Instructional Technology initiatives. System Leaders will facilitate this program along with others on the PALSave Administration Team at PALNI. The PALSave initiative will provide a resources and framework for open educational resource awareness, education, and engagement, based on the OTN model.
The PALSave Team will be in touch soon to form teams of ambassadors to foster OER on PALNI-supported campuses. Later this Fall, OTN staff will be facilitating an Open Textbook Workshop for these campus leaders. The PALSave Admin Team, in concert with campus ambassadors like librarians and instructional designers, will support faculty adoptions of affordable learning materials across the PALNI institutions.
For more information about PALSave: PALNI Affordable Learning and to get in touch, please email palsave@palni.edu or get in touch with one of our team members. Meet the system leaders and the whole team here: https://palsave.palni.org/palsave-team/