What's in it for me?

One of the best parts of my job here at Connexions is explaining our philosophy and commitment to open education to potential authors, educators, and students. This is one of the easiest things I've ever been paid to do, as the challenge for me is trying not to come across as a zealot who doesn't know when to shut up and stop selling past the close.

The first question folks ask when hearing about Connexions for the first time is usually something along the lines of, "What exactly is open education?"

To the educators, I explain how open education - and Connexions in particular - allows them the opportunity to create customized books targeted to meet the unique needs of specific districts, schools, classrooms, or even individual students. I explain how teachers and professors can reuse existing modules and/or create their own original works, giving them complete control over the materials used in their courses. I show them how Connexions materials available online can also be downloaded in PDF form to post on course websites, printed off as handouts, or even ordered as print-on-demand textbooks.



At this point in the conversation, the educators are sold. They want to know more.

To the students, I start with two words: "Free textbooks." Then I go into the day-to-day advantages. "Read your textbooks online or download all of your course materials to your computer and print them off whenever you want." "Encourage your professors to adopt and customize existing content so you don't have to buy large, bulky texts full of chapters that will likely never be covered." "Think about how you can use Connexions to create collaborative projects with students in your class or across the globe.

"

The students look at me with a smile. "You had me at 'free'," they say.

At this point in the conversation, we turn to the authors. So far they've been polite, listening in as their counterparts get excited and happy enough to share in their enthusiasm ... until they ask the question.

You know what question I'm talking about, the one that seems a bit selfish and out of place amid all of the warm-fuzzies that you get talking about free education and the sharing of ideas, even though everybody has been thinking about it since the beginning of the conversation.

It's OK. It's an important question, and one that needs to be addressed, so please don't be shy. Go ahead and ask.

"What's in it for me?"

The reason authors ask this question isn't because they're greedy or self-centered. Far from it. They ask it because the whole concept of open education doesn't fit the traditional models for academic publication. Content has to come from somewhere, and the conventional wisdom is that it comes from an author seeking royalties for their work through commercial sales of a published book.

But is that really accurate? If we're only talking about money, this doesn't add up. With a few notable exceptions, most textbook authors don't stand to make much money from royalties. Sure, they may take home a few hundred or even a few thousand dollars a year, but when you factor in all of the hours they spent creating and revising draft after draft after draft of the material, chances are you'd end up making more cash by forgetting about the Ph.D. and taking a job at the local drive-thru burger joint. Most of the time, the only people who make any real money are the publishers, and while it's true that they provide a valuable service, it's staggering to think of how disproportionate the profit-sharing model really is.

So if the money isn't a factor, then why do it? Most authors will cite the same two or three reasons. "I need publications so I can get tenure." "I want to make a name for myself." And, of course, the real reason that everybody got into this line of work in the first place: "I want to advance my field." These issues were driving scholars to become master teachers and make breakthroughs in research long before the publishers got involved in the academic scene. Money isn't the main motivator here, and it's important for everybody - authors included - to keep that in mind when talking about authors getting rewarded for their hard work and valuable contributions.

The reality is that authors can still enjoy all of these benefits by publishing their content under an open license, and in many cases more effectively. Below is a short list of ways in which publishing in Connexions can actually be MORE beneficial to authors than working under the traditional model:

• Authors do not need to finish their work before publication. While most editors wouldn't think of going to press without a finished product, Connexions allows authors to publish one-module at a time, allowing them to make their ideas available to the public faster.


• Authors wishing to profit from their work under the traditional model can release individual modules under an open license, allowing potential customers to gauge the quality, accuracy, and relevance of their works though self-contained, bite-sized samples.


• Graduate students and new professors can take advantage of the self-publication model to begin establishing a name for themselves earlier in their careers. Publishing early drafts of their research and teaching materials allows for a formative feedback process involving experts worldwide, and because authors retain their copyrights they still have the option of traditional publication once those materials have been fully refined and developed.


• Connexions opens doors for many authors who are shut out of the traditional publication process. Professionals without advanced degrees, non-native English speakers with difficulty writing for editors, and iconoclasts who seek to challenge conventional wisdom within their field are just a few of the many groups that may never find success under the traditional publication model for reasons that have nothing to do with the quality of their ideas.


• Textbooks that are written to fill niches within a field may not be considered profitable enough by publishers' standards to ever make it into print. Self-publishing through Connexions ensures that an author's work is always available for anybody who wants it, no matter how esoteric or narrow in scope.


• Publishing in Connexions allows authors to share their work worldwide at no cost to the user, giving them access to literally millions of would-be readers instead of the few thousand that had no choice but to shell out $140 for a copy in the bookstore that semester. This greatly increases the utility and visibility of their work and, by extension, their contribution to their field.

This, of course, is not an exhaustive list, and I could go on and on. But as I said before, my job is to sell the philosophy, not to scare people away. :)

Usually, at this point in the conversation, the authors in the audience have begun to understand how they can benefit from Connexions and the open education philosophy. But there still remains one unanswered question that is of particular importance to those still trying to establish their careers:

"Will this count towards tenure?"

And that, friends, is a question best left for a separate column. The short version is that there's no good reason that it shouldn't, but each case (and each department's tenure review process) is unique. If you think this might be a problem, I strongly encourage you to engage the senior members of your department and strike up a conversation about how open education can simultaneously lower the cost and raise the quality of education for students, while at the same time establishing a reputation for the department as a forward-thinking, quality-oriented organization. In the end, all we can do is make our case and hope that the obvious merits - coupled with an army of open education converts among the students, faculty, and administration - will be enough to ensure that tenure decisions are based on merit and quality of work, rather than conformity to a long-broken system that fails everyone involved - especially the authors.

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Talk back:

What are your feelings about the role of open education in the careers of young academics? Do you see potential for change or a barrier to innovation? Do you think that open education opens doors for authors or places an unrealistically low value for their contributions? We'd love to hear what you have to say!