Provosts' Views on Online Learning and OER

Eighty-three percent of provosts say they expect their institution to expand its online programs and offerings in the coming year, and 52 percent agree that they expect to make a "major allocation" of funds to online programs, according to Inside Higher Ed's 2018 Survey of College and University Chief Academic Officers.

Provosts were divided on a series of questions about the use of open educational resources and other low-cost instructional materials.

Thirty-five percent agreed -- and 42 percent disagreed -- that professors should be "open to changing textbooks or other materials to save students money, even if the lower-cost options are of lesser quality," and nearly half (48 percent) agreed that OER materials "are of sufficiently high quality that they should be used in most general education courses" (16 percent disagreed).

Slightly more provosts disagreed (41 percent) than agreed (38 percent) that the "need to help students save money on textbooks justifies some loss of faculty member control over selection of materials for the courses they teach."