eBook Publishing Tool Available – Request by 10/15

October 3, 2019

The Center for Instructional Innovation and ATUS have an exciting opportunity for a limited number of faculty to receive a free perpetual license to publish their own ebook using Pressbooks.

Last year, Washington State funded our CIIA/ATUS proposal, “Increasing College Affordability with OER Adoption at WWU.” As we rounded out the grant program, we found we were able to purchase via the grant a limited number of licenses for faculty to use the Pressbooks platform to create and publish ebooks for their students. But act fast; we can only customize your URLs through this month! Learn more: Pressbooks Information.

Between the State OER Grant and Student Tech Fee funding for this work, over 5,000 Western students are taking a course this fall that uses free text materials, saving them over $700,000 in textbooks costs. Open educational resources (OERs) include a variety of text and media materials that are free and openly accessible to students. See also: OER@Western

What is so interesting about this?

  • If you use a license ($99 value), it is yours to keep.
  • Each ebook will be watermark- and ad-free.
  • You are in control of the content; however, since the licenses were purchased with the OER grant, priority will go to applicants creating or reusing openly licensed (Creative Commons or Public Domain) material and providing the book or curated collection to students at no cost.
  • Since Pressbooks uses the WordPress interface, many people will find it easy to use and CIIA/ATUS will offer support.
  • You can have multiple editors/users for each ebook
  • The hardest part of committing to a license—besides developing the content—is figuring out the ebook address (_____.pressbooks.com). The address you select cannot be changed later.
  • The ability to create your own ebook address must be done by November, but you can keep the book unpublished, as you develop content, as long as you want.

Please email cii@wwu.edu to indicate your interest by the priority due date: Oct. 15.