Open textbook legislation introduced in US Congress

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Ethan Senack

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Oct 9, 2015, 11:10:59 AM10/9/15
to open-poli...@googlegroups.com
(Apologies for any cross-posting)

Hi everyone,

Exciting news from the United States: yesterday afternoon, a bill was introduced in the U.S. Congress to support open textbook pilot programs at colleges and universities. The bill adds to the growing momentum in the U.S. federal government for OER, and also provides strong model language that can be useful in other policy efforts. There is likely a long path ahead to getting the bill passed, but taking this first step is a victory in itself. We hope you will join us in celebrating the great news!

Below is a bunch of information about the bill and media to amplify.

Information about the bill:

Social media posts to share/retweet:

Sponsors to thank:
@SenatorDurbin @alfranken @SenAngusKing @USRepRHinojosa @RepJaredPolis

Hashtags: #textbookbroke #oerusa


Sample media coverage:

Thanks all,

Ethan


-- 
Ethan Senack
Higher Education Advocate
U.S. Public Interest Research Group
www.uspirg.org
@HigherEdPIRG
(202) 546-9707 x321

Luis Villa

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Oct 9, 2015, 12:07:17 PM10/9/15
to Ethan Senack, Open Policy Network
How does it define "open"?

Luis

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Luis Villa
Sr. Director of Community Engagement
Wikimedia Foundation
Working towards a world in which every single human being can freely share in the sum of all knowledge.

Ethan Senack

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Oct 9, 2015, 12:15:57 PM10/9/15
to Luis Villa, Open Policy Network
Hi Luis,

Here's the definition from the bill:

(3) OPEN EDUCATIONAL RESOURCE.—The term ‘‘open educational resource’’ means an educational resource that either is in the public domain or is made available under a permanent copyright license to the public to freely adapt, distribute, and otherwise use the work with attribution to the author as designated.

Ethan

Luis Villa

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Oct 9, 2015, 12:28:24 PM10/9/15
to Ethan Senack, Open Policy Network
Pretty solid - great to hear. (I could see some quibbling about "to the public" as allowing non-commercial restrictions.) Thanks!

Nicole Allen

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Oct 9, 2015, 12:50:19 PM10/9/15
to Open Policy Network
This is actually something we updated from the 2013 version of the bill. Originally we defined OER as CCBY licensed materials only, but this year we constructed the definition to include other open licenses. This aligns better with the Hewlett definition, and gives pilot programs a broader pool of existing materials to use and adapt. 

Naturally, we did specify CCBY for materials that are created with grant funds. Here is the language for that:

(f) LICENSE.—Educational resources created under subsection (e) shall be licensed under a non-exclusive, permanent license to the public to exercise any of the rights under copyright conditioned only on the requirement that attribution be given as directed by the copyright owner.

The 2015 bill has not been posted online yet, but I’m attaching what we were told is the final draft. The 2013 bill is here: https://www.congress.gov/bill/113th-congress/senate-bill/1704


AEG15763.pdf
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