Abstract
The advent of e-book and open access publishing has not yet been as potent as some would hope (and others fear) in its disruption of commercial textbook publishing. However, universities are under increasing pressure to provide students with all the resources they need for their courses, without further cost to the student. Jisc is funding four teams to produce eight e-textbooks to test the processes, expertise required and outcomes when universities take on the job of publishing course texts themselves. With five books now published, and two years since the start of the project, some of the differences in the strategies adopted by the teams are starting to emerge. Teams have reflected on what they have learned and might change if they published more titles, and offer some advice for others considering similar projects.
Highlights
Jisc’s mission is to enable UK further and higher education to exploit the full possibilities of technology and content and get the best value for money
Open access (OA) publishing and digital publishing may offer the promise of possible cost savings and an enhanced user experience as compared to traditional print models, but progress in the area of core textbook publishing has been slow
E-textbooks were deemed a potential solution by the libraries that participated in the study – offering an opportunity to support those high-demand, short-loan titles and overcome student dissatisfaction at peak times of use
Summary
Jisc’s mission is to enable UK further and higher education to exploit the full possibilities of technology and content and get the best value for money. Over the last two or three years there has been renewed interest, in the library community, in re-establishing the concept of the university press, with some notable new presses appearing in the last year or so.[8] With ‘the idea that the the introduction in the UK of higher fees for courses, students expect to find their required reading available at no extra cost, so the idea that the university itself should produce their textbooks seems entirely logical It is an interesting and appropriate moment for Jisc to be providing the funding that enables a few universities to experiment with publishing university itself should produce their textbooks seems entirely logical’. In the institution as e-textbook publisher project, the overarching question the project seeks to answer is: Will the institution as e-textbook creator help students by providing a more affordable higher education, and promote a better, more sustainable information environment for libraries, students and faculty?9
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