International Journal of Open Educational Resources Volume 2, Issue 1, Fall 2019/Winter 2020 | Page 15

International Journal of Open Educational Resources • Vol. 2, No. 1 • Fall 2019 / Winter 2020
3 Questions for an OER Leader
| Featuring Marilyn Billings
Hilary Baribeau, University of Wyoming’s
Digital Scholarship Librarian
and Guest Editor for this Special Issue
of IJOER sat down to interview Marilyn
Billings, the head of the Scholarly Communication
Office at the University of Massachusetts,
Amherst, pioneer of the Open Education
movement, and our featured OER Leader.
1Hilary: You are a founding member
of the Open Textbook Network
(OTN). Can you talk a little bit
about the initial goals of OTN and what
you envision as the future of OTN?
Marilyn: What I saw as some of the
initial goals of the Open Textbook
Network were to build a community
that could work on Open Education
together so that we could all build on
our respective strengths. More than just
librarians, OTN could include faculty,
instructional designers, academic computing
and technology support folks. As
a community, OTN could start building
tools that all of us could use, rather than
each institution building its own tools
separately. In that way, we could build
on each other’s ideas and exponentially
grow the Open Education movement.
Another initial goal of the OTN was to
create workshops that were for specific
audiences. We created one that is specifically
for librarians, one specifically
for faculty, and others for folks that support
Open Education in their colleges
and universities. That way, we can target
the specific needs of each of those
groups as they move forward.
2Hilary: And what do you think are
some of the future goals of OTN?
Marilyn: Some of the future goals
include building more resources that
are available for students. I should say
that I am an Open Textbook Network
presenter for the librarian group so,
when I go off and do site visits, there is
often also a request to meet with students.
I created a presentation that is
really targeted for them and helps students
find links to resources that they
can use for their own advocacy efforts
going forward at their respective institutions.
Another area that we are working on is
the need to build more ancillary materials.
We hear from faculty that there’s
a need for those kinds of materials,
whether it’s videos, quizzes, PowerPoint
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doi: 10.18278/ijoer.2.1.2