Anne Schreiber Interview Notes - August 31, 2009

Conducted with Carolina Rossini via telephone on August 31, 2009, concerning Curriki's view of the OER landscape.

Interviewee

• Anne Schreiber
  • Chief Academic Officer, Curriki
  • Email: aschreiber [at] curriki [dot] org

AND

• Peter Levy
  • Strategic Partnerships, Curriki
  • Email: plevy [at] curriki [dot] org

Notes

Partnerships with Traditional Publishers

Peter on Pearson

• Pearson had lots of conversations with Curriki
• Pearson did not release their textbook with an open license, but they just released it for free
  • Pearson seems to be guarded and cautious.
  • Thinks that they would to refine their business with their consumers.
• I see the value of them [Pearson] in the future to provide products that can be customized
  • The value may not be in selling the same book for many in the future
  • The relationship may be much more in a consultant position to built customized curriculum and informed by the state test results.

General Discussion

• Anne: Publishers still see their content as a “premium content”

  “We spent so millions of dollars to put together a certain content”

• Peter: I agree that they think that.
  • But customers (ex. Georgia) with huge budget problems may decide to not buy even if the quality is not assured
  • So they may spent some time taking a look at what is free and open

Adoption Process (Peter)

• Adoption process is clearly dying

  Differed until 2013 in California; now it is free textbooks, not open

• The adoption process is near a end

  The nature of what is possible with technologies really breaks the idea of an inflexible textbook

Positioning Curriki in OER and Publishing (Peter)

• We [Curriki] put ourselves as “thought leaders”
  • And try to have them [partners?] come to us.
• I have been doing this for 3 years and it has changed a lot
  • People in the publishing industry do not understand what OER or what CC is
  • Publishers or teachers: Anything they find that is accessible is seen as "free"
• The issues in music made people more aware, but still not there
  • So, publishers are “awaking” for it just now
  • It may take years to see the market and business models change, since they have been doing the same for decade
  • Even longer if they wait to see that it is still profitable, and they expect that this will go away.
  • This may be very true mainly to the K-12, very young

Curriki's Future Development

Strategic Plan (Anne)

• We keep developing and changing; we are developing models as we go
• Big strategic plan process to move the product forward.
  • Content repository: “innovation zone” and “core content area”
  • Develop core content
  • And charge for customization or similar
  • Engage California teachers in the adaptation of books that Curriki is publishing

    But for that we need to see this as a “project”

• Peter: we are thinking about incentives

Curriki as Platform (Anne)

• We would like the districts to see us as a platform
  • But what the district sees is another “vendor” with another “tool”.
  • They do not see this as a “platform to capture the expertise of our teachers.
• DATA: Peter: 10% of teachers in the country (3010) cut their expenditure by 50% of average spent for teacher: we would save 700 millions dollars per year
• Unit-size: tremendous issue that we still did not figure out

  ”Core content” unit: 3 to 4 weeks of instruction = similar to the “uber” chapter (ex. “the planets”)

Innovation Zone (Anne)

• Planned 4 tiers of criteria
  • File checker (“illegal or inappropriate” 24hr to 72hr)
  • Peer review in 2 parts
    • Members comment anything on the system (comment tab, start future, etc.)
      • Now content can be searched by rating
      • Allow volunteers to “become OER citizens"
    • Curriki Review System
      • (Hopefully will be volunteer): Currently part-time teachers w/ 10 years or more of experience

        They have 2 reviewers per subject

      • They received a grant for their review system
      • About 30% of the content gets review in this way
      • It is a very rigorous path
• Peter: We need to meet/help districts in the level/state they are
  • So quality is necessary before we have mass adoption
  • We can let the “innovation zone” evolve

    But we can move things from the “innovation zone” to the “core content zone”.

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