Workflows and Processes

Once a UTSA Pressbooks book is finished, there are several steps in the branding and marketing process that come next. Some of these will need to be automatic, while others can be determined by the faculty member. We may enlist faculty in the process of sharing the new Pressbooks title at other levels and to their own disciplinary distribution networks. We will want to weigh the advantages and disadvantages of scaling sharing out. The processes outlined below are preliminary and subject to change as our Pressbooks network matures at UTSA.

The Open Education Network has an OER Publishing Toolkit. It covers the entire scope of OER Publishing Projects: from planning to publication to maintenance. The OEN Pub 101 course has great guidance on marketing an open textbook.  The chapter on Communications from the BC Campus Self Publishing Guide is also a great resource.

For now, this chapter will focus on processes and workflows for adding completed UTSA Pressbooks titles to Library Quick Search, Runner Research Press, and OERTX. Each of these will be automatic once a book is finished. We may also want to create a checklist for marketing tailored to the book’s intended audience and author preferences in order to achieve the widest reach.

Library Quick Search

UTSA Libraries would like to include completed Pressbooks books in Library Quick Search. While Pressbooks does not yet have a MARC Record export, DeeAnn spoke with Steel Wagstaff at Pressbooks on 7/28/21, and Pressbooks plans to add this feature to the platform by the end of 2022 if not before.  For more on this, please see the MARC Record Export discussion on the Pressbooks GitHub. Prior to working for Pressbooks, Steel worked at the University of Wisconsin and created a side-by-side of Pressbooks metadata fields and how they correlate to MARC record fields: Pressbooks -MARC metadata mapping.

As an interim fix, the OER Coordinator will work with UTSA authors and cataloging staff to add published UTSA Pressbooks to Alma/Primo.  We are currently determining whether the OER Coordinator or cataloging staff will complete the MARC Record Template developed by Mount Hood Community College for published UTSA Pressbooks titles. This workflow will only stay in place until Pressbooks adds MARC record as an export type.

Runner Research Press

Pressbooks includes a plug-in called Excalibur, which is currently turned on at the network level and available from the ‘Publish’ menu on the UTSA Pressbooks network for every book.  UTSA Libraries has added language to the UTSA Pressbooks Terms of Use that notifies all UTSA Pressbooks users that published UTSA Pressbooks titles will automatically be added to Runner Research Press. A strategy for checking for published books needs to be determined as does versioning. Some questions to help guide us are below:

• How are we going to monitor and check for updates?
• Can DeeAnn or Chayla be notified when updates are made to Pressbooks titles?
• If we cannot receive notifications, we can check periodically within Pressbooks for changes.
  • But how often should we check?

Versioning in RR Press

Per Kristi Park, 7/21/21: “DSpace does have linear versioning capabilities (i.e. you can create a new version of an Item from the most recent version), but it is not set up by default and I don’t believe we currently have another member using it. Nick is looking into what it would take to set it up for you and we’ll get back to you shortly with more.”

DeeAnn reached out to the SPARC list in order to compile feedback from others about OER and IR archiving. Responses to her questions are linked here.

• Even though DSpace has a process for versioning, do we want to version?  If yes, we may want to use language from Grand Valley State University which is CCO licensed:
  • Published OER can be updated with minor changes or republished in a new edition as needed. We strongly recommend publication of a new edition of an OER if the revisions would create a substantively different experience for users interacting with the OER (e.g., altered homework problems, reordered chapters, significant new information). We defer to authors’ expertise to determine whether a new edition is appropriate.
  • We commit to provide ongoing access to all OER content once it has been uploaded. If a new edition is published, the prior editions will remain available with metadata noting the new edition. In order to accurately communicate the status of each OER, we expect project partners to alert us to any subsequent editions or other changes.”

OERTX

If the OER is for a Texas Core Course, we will provide instructions for authors to submit to OERTX.

Response from University of Houston:

“I can share what we’re doing, though it’s not an automated process. We’re working on archiving OER created by UH faculty in our IR, including but not limited to those created on Pressbooks. This was largely inspired by the launch of OERTX, as I knew we’d have faculty with OER not on Pressbooks and thus would need to have it hosted somewhere before being able to share to OERTX.

1. Reach out to faculty member to invite them to submit their work to the IR. Our Pressbooks Terms of Servicestates that by using Pressbooks they agree to have their work posted in the IR, however, I still think it’s best to confirm with them first. We have a very “DIY” approach to publishing on Pressbooks, so it’s likely that something available on our PB catalog isn’t finished to the point where the faculty member wants it archived or more broadly distributed yet.
2. Faculty sends me the files they wanted posted to the IR.
3. I work with some library colleagues to determine item-level metadata to the extent possible (this is where we currently are with the first batch of materials to be posted).
4. Share metadata with faculty member via a Google Doc so they can make corrections and fill in missing info.
5. Post to IR in our Open Course Materials community. You can see we decided to structure the community by college and course name, though there are not any materials posted yet.

Our process right now is a lot more about communicating with the faculty member, and not the technical/automated process sort of thing you were probably hoping for!

We’re not expecting faculty to update their IR submission every time they make updates to their OER (unless they want to), so we’re including the Pressbooks URL in the abstract so users can be directed to the most updated version of the work. I haven’t explored adding Pressbooks titles directly to our discovery system (though the IR records will be discoverable) – good to know that Pressbooks have some future plans for that!

Also thank you for mentioning Excalibur – I didn’t know about it and neither did my colleague who’s working on this project with me, so we’ll be talking about it at our next meeting.

Hope this helps a little!”