Earlier in the week we heard from Paul Shaber on his experiences of using OpenStax College (OSC) textbooks. Today we’re going to hear from two more educators, who I was fortunate enough to speak with earlier in the year: Elise Adamson and Adrienne Williams. This post is dedicated to excerpts from Elise’s interview and you can find Adrienne’s interview here.

Thanks to both Elise and Adrienne for taking time out to speak with me!

Elise Adamson 

Elise Adamson (Wayland Baptist University) is Professor of Math and Physics. Elise has been using the OSC Physics book with students who are largely studying to go into medicine. She is the first in her University to be using the materials and had support from both her bookstore and colleagues for using OSC. Sapling introduced Elise to OpenStax, her “first exposure” to open educational resources (OER).

Listen to Elise tell us more about how she uses OSC Physics:

Elise told us about the challenges she faces when looking for OER:

Elise on whether the way she uses OSC and Sapling materials is different from, or similar to, her usual teaching practice:

I also asked Elise whether there had been any impact on her students as result of using OSC textbooks. Listen to Elise tell us more about what students like about the text:

We returned to the question of impact on students toward the end of the interview and Elise noted that financial savings were the area where she had seen the biggest difference:

Elise also told us what openness in an educational context means to her:

Thanks again to Elise for taking the time out to speak with me; we really appreciate it!