Santa Ana College Awarded the Zero Textbook Cost Degree Grant
by the California Community College Chancellor's Office
The Zero Textbook Cost (ZTC) Degree
program is one of the Open Educational Resources (OER) initiatives to
improve teaching, learning, and accessibility for all learners at
California Higher Education institutions. SAC is one of 20 California
Community Colleges to be awarded the Implementation Phase II RFA for
2017/18. Courses designated as Zero Textbook Cost eliminate conventional textbook costs by using alternative instructional materials and methodologies, including open educational resources.
ZTC Course Designation
Faculty: How to determine if your course is a Zero Textbook Cost course:
The State has established parameters for what constitutes “zero-textbook-cost”:
- If all assigned textbooks are optional for the section
- If all assigned textbooks are identified as Open Educational Resource (OER) textbooks
- If there is no assigned textbook
- If the assigned textbooks (including course readers) are available online for free (i.e. through library databases) AND students are not required to buy a physical copy
- (Note: for course readers and online materials, faculty are responsible for adhering to copyright and accessibility requirements)
Other considerations:
- Lab materials or required supplies are not considered a textbook cost, so if a course section meets the parameters noted above, but do require a materials fee – then the section WOULD still qualify textbook cost free per State guidelines.
- If students need to pay fees to access a software platform to do coursework or homework, this counts as a cost. The course section would NOT qualify.
- A course must be replacing a textbook with an associated cost, with zero textbook cost materials to qualify for the ZTC designation.
To have your course designated as a ZTC course, please send all ZTC courses/section numbers for the upcoming semester to disted@sac.edu. If you are unsure if a section should be considered for inclusion as “zero cost” in the schedule of classes, please contact our office!
