Vulnerable Faculty and OER

This week I read the IOWA Toolkit regardign OER and Tenure.


    This addresses the issues surrounding tenure and open education. There is a push to make our materials, resources and other activities available so that education is available to those who seek it. However, most faculty, who are generally going to be the subject matter experts, may have difficulty finding time to contribute to these resources. New faculty members have responsibilities that require them to publish research and there are strict requirements for where these can be published to have them count toward tenure. 


    This document  makes points that are useful for faculty members to use so that they can make the argument to their department chair and dean.  This approach seems to be taking a bottom-up approach and is a slow means of change through the process of helping to use OER publications as a part of other requirements on their time, like tenure requirements. If we can get those who are trying to get tenure now to be in favor of using OER, they will be more likely to accept it when they are in charge of looking at the tenure packets of others in the future.  That seems to be the solution.


    There are Institutional Review Boards for the sake of protecting those who are in vulnerable populations. We are much more careful and respectful of those people.  We try not to impose on them and it's the same for new professors. Scholars don't want to reach out to new faculty members because they have other responsibilities. Those other responsibilities should and easily be used to help them progress in their careers. By expecting them to do both, they may need to be forced to choose between the greater good and yet, choosing the greater public good could be detrimental to their career and possibly financial well being.

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