Faculty Stipend to Create Course Materials

A few months back we posted an article about UMass Amherst giving faculty stipends to create open educational materials, now Temple University is doing something similar.  Details are not clear whether Temple is following an open textbook model but they are encouraging faculty to develop digital alternatives to a traditional textbooks.   Temple is awarding $1,000 grants to faculty to find ways to give students low cost course materials that faculty can build from scratch, according to this story.  One of the goals of the program is to create new kinds of learning experiences while keeping costs down for students.

What’s happening at Temple could be a new trend in higher Ed.  As more downward pressure is put on keeping college affordable faculty and institutions are going to find ways to deliver better quality with less money.   This model is very similar to our message about growing custom course materials that gives the students exactly what they need to succeed in the classroom. 

Grow Custom Campaign and Initial Sponsors Announced

At NMS we have often in the past spoken about shifting store focus from "margins" to "market share" in recognition that our business environment and core product are changing.  A common question has been, "Well, how do we do that?"  

In response, starting this month and going through the coming year we will be focusing on a Grow Custom, Grow Green  initiative.   Through blog postings here, a range of activities at CAMEX later this month, subsequent webinars, articles, and other communications, NMS will be encouraging stores to explore options to grow the volume of custom course materials and other custom product sold through campus stores.

To be clear, we are not talking about "dumb custom" here, which traditional has been viewed as a poor product, and justifiably so. For more on smart versus dumb custom, please read our prior post on that topic from a couple weeks ago.



The Grow Custom initiative is about growing good value, good products, and good business.

We know that many stores have traditionally resisted custom course materials for a range of reasons.  Today's (and tomorrow's) custom is not what it once was.  The data we are observing suggests that the custom movement, whether stores choose to participate or not, will be larger than the recent shift to rental -- a model which transformed some aspects of the North American college store industry over the past two years.  Stores that forgo engaging in growing custom will see further market share reduction.  Stores cannot pass on this opportunity to help students acquire the "just what you need to succeed" course materials for the classroom.  The future of custom is not just a "win-win" for stores and their communities, but a "win, win, win."

We are NOT alone.
The good news is that there are many companies and organizations -- both old and new to our industry -- which can help stores be more successful with growing custom.  Even better, they recognize the value of the college store in the custom equation. 

NMS is excited to announce our first TEN sponsor partners of the Grow Custom initiative.  At CAMEX they will be highlighting their solutions and NMS will be coordinating a range of activities to give stores exposure to what is happening in the custom space.  We will soon be providing links to additional information about each of these sponsors and will provide additional information through the NMS website.  We strongly encourage you to take the time to attend product spotlights, visit booths, watch demos, and talk with these organizations about what they are doing in the custom space. 

Our initial 10 sponsors include the following organizations:

We thank these sponsors of the Grow Custom initiative.  At CAMEX and in the coming weeks be prepared to hear more about the Grow Custom initiative and these organizations.  Watch for more information throughout this month and 2012.  Be sure to check out our sponsors of this initiative at a later date, and view the NMS Grow Custom information page often as information about our sponsors and other opportunities or resources will be added regularly.  You can also complete an Interest in Participation Form to learn more about this or other current NMS initiatives.

Custom Course Materials: Smart or Dumb?

Over the next few months, leading up to, during, and following CAMEX, NACS Media Solutions (NMS) will be promoting a "Grow Custom, Grow Green" initiative in the college store industry.  This initiative will focus on building awareness and encouraging college stores to develop or adopt business practices in support of the adoption of custom course materials.

A logo for this initiative has been designed and NMS has begun to recruit partners in this promotional effort.  To date we have just under a dozen companies and organizations that have agreed to participate in the initiative -- from large publishers to small startups.  We will talk more about those partners in the weeks leading up to CAMEX.

One of our partners in this effort is the Collegiate Retail Alliance (CRA).  The CRA has been working diligently with publishers and leading college stores in this area -- such as the college store at Broward College in Florida.  The CRA is creating a toolkit for stores to assist in developing custom so that it is easier to grow their custom business.  NMS will support the CRA initiative in several ways, but in particular we hope to facilitate the wider sharing of knowledge and best practices in this area, as well as increase awareness of the value of custom course materials. 

To be clear, this initiative is not about “dumb custom” – i.e., the “custom that is not customized.”  For example, taking a book, ripping off the cover, putting in the faculty syllabus (maybe), and putting a new cover on with the school and faculty member names on it would be considered "dumb custom."  Our focus is on “smart custom” – i.e., custom aggregated content that is aligned or matched to student learning outcomes. Smart custom is created in partnership with faculty and linked to course descriptions, syllabi, and accreditation targets for student learning outcomes. It is in recognition that one of the biggest complaints of students is that the faculty member does not use large portions of the course materials required, and also considers where course materials are headed in the future with increasingly custom course material offerings.


There is ample evidence to show that by building custom (and by that I mean smart custom, not dumb custom) stores can lower the cost of course materials for students, increase the value of the course material product for students, increase faculty satisfaction, increase store and publisher revenues, and create an opportunity for competitive advantage.  It is a strong win for nearly all players.  It is a sound strategy for building market share and driving traffic.  The strategic timing for focusing on custom is now as the percentage of custom is poised to grow and many of the college store's traditional and future partners are focused on customized learning solutions.

Custom does not by default negate book buyback or the used book market.  Many custom books can be bought back.  Increasingly course materials will likely shift away from used books, particularly on the digital side (where there is no used market), but even with print (where growing rental adoption further reduces the used supply or selection).  Beyond that, there are ways to reduce the cost of custom even further (e.g., "binder ready" or "ala cart" versions) in order to make them more competitive with used options in the eyes of students.

Our interest is in growing high-value (i.e., smart) custom which is more aligned to student learning outcomes and in recognition that the old "one-size-fits-all" approach to course materials is beginning to change toward a "just-what-you-need-to-succeed model.   Publishers are moving toward models where they are pressed not not to provide just a standard textbook, but one which enhances the learning outcomes in the classroom.  Custom can also help institutions as they work to differentiate themselves and what they teach. We are trying to increase the intrinsic value of the products being supplied so that when students make a purchase from the college store they know that not only is it the correct materials for the course, but that the materials are there because the faculty member intends to use them in the classroom as a part of achieving targeted learning outcomes. In this way, college stores contribute to student success academically, while also improving the affordabilty of educaiton. 

Smart custom also recognizes that each faculty member teaches a topic a little differently, and moving toward custom is therefore in part about the traditional academic mission of most college stores, the relationship between stores and faculty, and how stores add value to a community.  It also recognizes that the top factors that most faculty consider when making a textbook selection is how the textbook fits "what they want to teach" and "how they want to teach it."  Price is often a distant next factor.  Smart custom helps stores provide faculty with materials that better fit their top two decision criteria, while at the same time reducing costs and increasing relevance/value -- which are top decision factors for students.  Traditional course materials, whether new or used, often no longer accomplish that alignment or level of value delivery. 

Growing custom also allows stores and faculty to better embrace the open source (OER) movement.  If we can develop the proper mechanisms, faculty could choose to blend the OER and commercial content which best fits their interests -- and OER content could be made more visible to faculty. Doing so has the potential to further reduce course material costs.  That makes it less of an "either-or" decision, and more of a "which pieces of content work best together to improve student learning outcomes in my classroom" type of decision.

Focusing on custom is not just about store sales.  Done right (again, smart custom, not dumb custom) focusing on custom can reduce cost and increase value for students.  Is it good for bookstore sales?  I hope so -- sales should increase if the value delivered increases.  More importantly, it is about strengthening the alignment of the store to the academic mission it was created to serve.  Custom (whether digital or print) is going to be a growing part of the course materials landscape in the years ahead and stores would be unwise to ignore the market opportunity, or the student value proposition.

So watch for more news, announcements, and information about the NMS Grow Custom initiative in 2012.  We aim to build awareness and grow the volume of custom course materials available through stores.  We will have several activities at CAMEX focused on the Grow Custom initiative and our partners.  We will be updating our website to list our partners and provide links to information on their products and services.  You can also complete an Interest in Participation Form to learn more about this or other current NMS initiatives.

More Tools for Professors to Customize Textbooks

The Chronicle recently reported on a trend we have been monitoring for a while.  From small start-ups to the big publishers, custom textbooks are becoming the common denominator in digital publishing.  With pressure from students who complain course materials are overpriced, professors are taking the Frankenstein mash-up approach to adopting course materials these days by taking materials from here and there, making textbooks much more affordable.

Customized course materials is not a new concept for faculty, pubishers, or college stores, but new innovations in digital technology in conjunction with the open source movement are enabling new growth in this course material segment.  Moving content to this segment is often beneficial as it reduces the cost of course materials for students, provides faculty with resources more tailored to their classes, and sell-through via the store improves. 

The Chronicle article covers several of the players -- new and traditional -- who currently operate in the custom publishing area. 

BookRiff Announces ‘Build Your Own Book’ Platform Launch

PublisherWeekly (PW) reports that, BookRiff, a novel digital publishing company will go live with their technology on October 6^th.  BookRiff’s platform uses an ePub reader and allows users to create their own book by piecing together chapters, articles, or other content.  Users pay for content which is delivered in a variety of formats such as print-on-demand and content rights holders are given royalties.   According to PW, publishers who will provide content include O'Reilly Media, Harvard Common Press, Stonesong Press, Sterling Publishers, EnThrillEntertainment, as well as Douglas & McIntyre, Greystone Books and New Society Publishers.

There are a growing number of competitors to enable campus creation of "mashable" books -- a category we traditionally refer to as custom publishing or coursepacks.  Cengage has probably received some of the greatest press around this concept, but AcademicPub, BookMasters, LiquidText, Xanadu, and others offer comparable solutions.  As custom publishing grows as a way to preserve market share, grow revenue, and decrease course materials costs for students, it is likely that others will enter this space with potential solutions for faculty and stores. 

Copyright licensing on campus

Here is an interesting project going on at Stanford University. It is called the Stanford IP Exchange (SIPX) and the system is intended to provide tailored copyright licenses on campus. The project includes both print on demand (POD) and publishing on demand technologies, and addresses a problem we have heard from faculty at various institutions.  The custom coursepack business is, of course, a solid percentage of the textbook market, and is likely to increase in the future with many comparable initiatives underway.  This project has some interesting elements to it, however, and is another worth watching.