The University of Tasmania is a participating institution in an open textbook publishing initiative run by the Council of Australian University Librarians CAUL Open Educational Resources Collective.

The Collective provides a shared open textbook publishing platform for CAUL Member institutions in Australia and New Zealand, with the aim of facilitating independent publishing by authors at participating institutions, as well as collaborative, cross-institutional publishing.

Our membership means UTAS has space to publish at least two open textbooks per year on the publishing platform Pressbooks.

Our academics have:

• the opportunity to apply to the Collective's annual open textbook grant program;
• access to training, guides and templates; and
• access to the Academic Authors Community of Practice.

Tip! Get an idea for how your open textbook could look and feel. Visit the OER Collective Catalogue and explore the collection of open textbooks authored by academics from other participating Australian universities.

Why publish with us?

Give our UTAS students' chance at academic success a boost.

Creating, publishing and offering UTAS open course textbooks contributes to our commitment to Sustainable Development Goals 4 and 10 by interrupting systemic barriers to quality higher education.

Your open textbook will:

• Provide students free and unrestricted access
• Increase student engagement and a sense of belonging using our local context and a diversity of viewpoints

Our Pressbooks platform allows you to create a new open textbook or adapt an existing open textbook for use as a dynamic resource in your teaching.

You are able to:

• Tailor content to enhance deeper learning and engagement
• Add local context, Indigenous perspectives and a diversity of viewpoints
• Update your book immediately and easily
• Add rich multimedia and interactivity
• Co-create content with your students

University of Tasmania educator, Sheree Lloyd, undertook a cross-institutional collaboration with other academics to co-author the open textbook Leading in Health and Social Care. The textbook is hosted by Griffith University Library on our shared Pressbooks platform.

Editing and writing an open textbook was a fantastic experience. Our Editorial Team chose open publishing to make the text freely available to health leaders, managers and students.

To achieve the United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goals, health and quality education are key and this open educational resource can be now used to guide practice in health service leadership and management, and strengthen health and social care systems.

Having written traditional texts in the past, working with Pressbooks and University librarians was an exciting challenge and experience that I would recommend to all who are considering writing in their discipline.