OER Advocacy Workshop Agenda and Goals

#oerpolicyworks
@txtbks @sparc_na
Scholarly Publishing & Academic
Resources Coalition
OER Advocacy
Workshop
Nicole Allen
Director of Open Education, SPARC
OER Policy Workshop (#OERPolicyWorks)
March 19, 2014 Warsaw, Poland

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Resources Coalition
Agenda
• 9:30 Overview of Day
• 9:45 Advocacy Basics
• 10:00 Overview: Campaign Development
• 10:15 Breakouts: Campaign Development
• 11:15 Break
• 11:30 Share: Campaign Development
• 12:30 Overview: Campaign Strategy
• 12:45 Lunch

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Agenda
• 13:45 Breakouts: Campaign Strategy
• 14:30 Share: Campaign Strategy
• 15:15 Overview: Campaign Communication
• 15:30 Breakouts: Campaign Communication
• 16:15 Share: Campaign Communication
• 16:45 Evaluation and next steps
• 17:00 End

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Goals
• Learn an effective model for
developing campaigns
• Begin planning your own policy
campaign
• Exchange ideas and receive
feedback with other participants

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Deliverables
Each country should have a (mostly)
complete campaign outline. There are two
options:
• Written on worksheets, which we’ll
photocopy before you leave
• Google doc:
http://sparc.arl.org/resource/oerpolicywork
s

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Advocacy Basics

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Advocacy
To take actions or make arguments
to advance (or deter) the passage of
a policy, or implementation of a
policy.

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Policy
“A definite course or method of action selected
from among alternatives and in light of given
conditions to guide and determine present and
future decisions.‖ (Merriam Webster Dictionary)

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Policy
“A definite course or method of action selected
from among alternatives and in light of given
conditions to guide and determine present
and future decisions.‖ (Merriam Webster
Dictionary)

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Policy vs. Program

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Policy Forum
The system in which a policy
operates — federal/state/local
government, institution, corporation,
etc.

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Decision Makers
Entities in charge of making the
decision to pass a policy (or how to
implement a policy).

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Stakeholders
Outside entities affected by a policy’s
implementation.

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Typical OER
Stakeholders
• Students
• Professors/Teachers
• Colleges/Universities/Schools
• Bookstores (for Higher Ed)
• Publishers

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Part 1: Campaign
Development

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Campaign Development
• Status Quo
• Problem
• Vision
• Solution
• Barriers

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Status Quo
The way things are now.

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Defining Status Quo
• Who selects content?
• Who purchases content?
• Where does the funding come from?
• Do all students have access to content?
• Is content up to date?
• Is content locally relevant?
• Does content support teaching &
learning?

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Resources Coalition
Example: Status Quo
• Who selects content?
– Individual professors
• Who purchases content?
– Individual students***
• Where does the funding come from
– Students themselves, with support from
public & private grants and loans
• Do all students have access to content
– No, many skip or delay buying books

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Example: Status Quo
• Is content up to date?
– Generally yes, but in some subjects can be
3-4 years out of date
• Is content locally relevant?
– Generally relevant to Americans, but not
always to local areas
• Does content support teaching & learning?
– Generally the quality is good, but the
problem is that students can’t afford
access

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Resources Coalition
Problem
What is wrong with the status quo?

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Example: Problem
• The cost of textbooks has risen rapidly, leaving too many
students unable to afford their materials. The result can
be lower grades, longer time to graduation, and student
debt.
• Textbook companies can drive up prices because
students are a captive market, and professors are not
always aware that more affordable options are available.
• The largest companies are curtailing the benefits of
technology by putting heavy restrictions on digital
materials and blocking innovators from entering the
market.

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Vision
How would the world look if the
problem didn’t exist?

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Example: Vision
• Technology makes it possible to distribute
information to a worldwide audience at virtually no
cost, and to enable new, better ways of teaching
and learning. OER is the most effective way to
leverage that potential.
• In a perfect world, higher education would make
widespread use of OER expanding affordable
access to textbooks, enabling instructors to adapt
materials to improve teaching, and supporting new
sustainable publishing models.

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Solution
What specific change or series of
changes could bring the world closer
to your vision?

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Example: Solution
• The key to solving the problem is to get more
professors to seek, consider and adopt OER.
• Specifically for that to be possible, professors
need both high quality content and support for
identifying, reviewing and adapting it to their
course.

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Resources Coalition
Barriers
What customs, policies, behaviors, or
entities stand in the way of your
solution?

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Example: Barriers
• Lack of funding or expertise to provide the kind
of support faculty need to transition to OER
• Uneven availability of high quality ready-to-use
open textbooks
• Faculty perceptions that OER are low quality
• Limited awareness of OER at colleges and
universities

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@txtbks @sparc_na
Resources Coalition
Breakout Groups
Fill out the Campaign Development form for
the situation in your country.
Google Docs/Downloads:
http://sparc.arl.org/resource/oerpolicywo
rks

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Resources Coalition
Share
Tell the group what you came up with for
Campaign Development.
rks

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Resources Coalition
Part 2: Campaign
Strategy

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Campaign Strategy
• Policy Proposal
• Target
• Timeframe
• Allies/Opposition
• Resources
• Influencers
• Strategy
• Tactics
Goal

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Policy Proposal
What policy will you propose to
implement your solution?

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Types of OER Policy
1. Invest resources explicitly in the
creation or adoption of OER
2. Inject open licensing into systems
that create educational resources
3. Endorse or call for OER
4. Remove barriers to OER
* This is a working theory, let’s see if it holds true outside the U.S.
*

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Policy Ideas
• Funding OER pilot programs
• Diverting textbook funding to
develop/deploy OER instead
• Open licensing policies for materials
created by professors or with public funds
• Adding OER to strategic plans

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Resources Coalition
Example: Policy Proposal
• Federally-funded grant program to support
the creation, improvement and adoption of
OER.

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Target
Who is the specific decision
maker, or group of decision
makers, that has the power to pass
your policy proposal?

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Target Ideas
• National government (incl. ministers)
• Provincial/local governments
• Leaders of schools/universities
• Funders of research/development

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Example Target
• Generally, U.S. Congress
• Specifically, members of the House and
Senate committees that work on higher
education

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Timeframe
When do you seek to pass your
policy proposal?

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Example: Timeframe
• In this case, we want to get the bill attached
to the “reauthorization” of our Higher
Education Act, so the timeframe will be
dependent on that.

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Goal
Your policy proposal put in terms of a
target and a timeframe. ―Get [target]
to [pass policy proposal] by
[timeframe].‖

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Resources Coalition
Example: Goal
• Get the U.S. Congress to pass a grant
program funding the
creation, improvement, and use of open
textbooks when it passes the Higher
Education Act reauthorization bill.

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Allies/Opposition
What people and organizations are
on your side? Who is against you?.

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Example: Allies
• Student organizations
• Other OER Groups: Creative Commons, etc.
• Senator Durbin, Congressman Hinojosa
• A few college groups
• Open textbook publishers
• Faculty groups?

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Example: Opposition
• Publishers, incl. companies and trade
associations
• Politicians who oppose federal spending

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Resources
What resources – including
money, manpower, connections, etc.
– do you and your allies have
available?

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Resources Coalition
Example: Resources
• Hewlett Foundation grant
• SPARC reserve budget
• 100+ U.S. SPARC library members in 45/50
states
• Good contacts with the press
• Open Access Working Group (OA coalition)
• Legislative action software

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Influencers
What entities and ideas can influence
your target to make the decision you
want them to make?

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Example: Influencers
• American voters, specifically those in the
states/districts of our targets.
– Students/Parents
– Professors
– Colleges
• The press
• Powerful members of Congress
• In some cases, the Administration
• Campaign donations

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Strategy
The theory for how you can achieve
your goal.

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Common Strategies
• Persuade target
• Incentivize target
• Put pressure on target
• Hold target accountable

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Example: Strategy
Demonstrate a broad base of constituent
support for the idea of textbook affordability
and open textbooks to incentivize – and in
some cases pressure – members of the House
and Senate education committees to support
the OER program’s inclusion in the Higher
Education Act, which will ultimately lead to its
passage.

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Resources Coalition
Tactics
The specific actions you take to
execute your strategy.

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Tactic Tips
• Best process is to brainstorm all possible
tactics, then pick the ones that fit with your
resources, then fit them into your timeline.
• We won’t have time for that today, so just
outline a few that you think are most
important.

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Resources Coalition
Example: Tactics
• Work with coalition to organize student
resolutions and letters and in key
states/districts.
• Generate media coverage on the issue.
• Build relationships with target offices.
• Organize educational briefing on Capitol Hill.
• Work with bill sponsors to reach out to
targets and convince them to support the
bill.

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Strategy or Tactic?
Organize presentation to faculty to
educate them about OER.

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Strategy or Tactic?
Persuade educators to make their
teaching materials available as OER.

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Strategy or Tactic?
Hold publishers publicly accountable
for their excessively high profit margins
to change their practices.

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Strategy or Tactic?
Organize a coordinated twitter
campaign to launch an OER portal.

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Resources Coalition
Breakout Groups
Fill out the Campaign Strategy form for the
policy proposal you are most interested in.
rks

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Agenda
• 13:45 Breakouts: Campaign Strategy
• 14:30 Share: Campaign Strategy
• 15:00 Overview: Campaign Communication
• 15:15 Breakouts: Campaign Communication
(incl. 15 min break)
• 16:00 Share: Campaign Communication
• 16:45 Evaluation and next steps
• 17:00 End

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Resources Coalition
Share
Campaign Strategy.
rks

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Resources Coalition
Part 3: Campaign
Communication

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Campaign
Communication
• Audience
• Frames
• Message
• Materials

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Audience
Who is your campaign oriented
towards? The target or someone who
influences the target?

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Example: Audience
There are two key audiences for our campaign:
• SPARC member librarians
• Target Congressional offices (equivalent to
members of the public)

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Frames
What pre-existing themes does your
audience associate with the topic?

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Example: Frames
Good frames:
• Textbooks, and higher ed in general, are
expensive.
• Student debt is a big problem.
• Education is important for the economy.
• Technology can solve problems.
Bad/problematic frames:
• You get what you pay for.
• If it’s too good to be true, it probably is.
• MOOCs are the cutting edge.

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Message
The case you make to your
audience.

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Message Structure
• Hook (Something that interests the target)
• Problem (Connect the hook to the problem)
• Solution (Why OER)
• Action (Why your policy proposal)
• Short message
• Long message

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Message Tips
• Use your list of frames and your list of
influencers
• Include key facts
• Explain things using language your audience
will understand
• Use active, colorful language

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Example: Tiny Message
Textbook costs are out of control and America can do
better. It's time to unleash the power of technology through
free open textbooks.

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Example: Short Message
Textbook costs are out of control and are driving students
deeper in debt. America should capitalize on today’s
technology to make textbooks affordable and better for
students. The most effective model is open textbooks,
which are free online to students and available for anyone
to use, adapt and share. Support the Affordable College
Textbook Act to expand the use of open textbooks at more
campuses, reducing costs for students and supporting
more innovative models for educatio.

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Example: Long Message
• Hook: Everyone knows that college costs are
skyrocketing and student debt has become a big
problem.
• Problem: Textbooks are a significant contributing
expense. Students spend $1,200 per year, and many
skip or delay buying textbooks because the cost is too
high. The traditional textbook system continues to drive
up costs, stifling competition and taking advantage of
students.
• Technology has the potential to solve this problem, but
only if we go about it the right way. Much of the existing
digital content has legal and technical restrictions that
prevent everything we’re used to doing on the Web –
reading free, copying, sharing, editing, etc.

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• Solution: The most effective model to unlock the
potential of technology is Open Educational
Resources, or “OER.” OER are academic materials
that are distributed free online with copyright
permissions for everyone to freely use, adapt and
share the content. Students can access OER at no
cost, professors can tailor the material to suit their
course, and print copies can be made at a low cost.
• OER is widely available in many subjects, and if more
professors start to leverage it, students would save 80-
100% on textbooks. Studies also show that OER
supports better grades because all students have
access.

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• Ask: The challenge is that professors are not always
aware of options like OER. The key is to provide more
support on campus.
• For this reason, we are asking you to co-sponsor the
Affordable College Textbook Act. This bill would fund
campus pilot programs to create, improve, and expand
use of OER. These pilots would directly reduce costs
for students, and any materials they create would be
freely available to the public too. The bill would also
reduce costs in the long run by enabling sustainable,
competitive business models to develop.

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Materials
How you communicate your
message to your audience

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External Materials
• Fact Sheet (2 page max)
• Myths and facts sheet (2 page max)
• Primer (longer, if your audience wants it)
• Webpage
• Infographic or related images
• List of “further reading”
• Op-Ed or good news clippings

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Internal Materials
• Talking points for meetings with targets
• Q&A for meetings with targets
• Document summarizing the campaign
strategy, tactics and timeline
• Document summarizing the campaign
message, frames and audience

#oerpolicyworks
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Resources Coalition
Breakout Groups
Fill out the Campaign Communications form
for your campaign.
rks

#oerpolicyworks
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Resources Coalition
Share
Campaign Communication.
rks

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Resources Coalition
Evaluation &
Next Steps

OER Advocacy Workshop Agenda and Goals

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