BYOT (Build Your Own Textbook) Initiative Succeeds

We can’t fit all the good stuff into each new issue of St. Norbert College Magazine that lands in your mailbox, but luckily there’s room at snc.edu/magazine for plenty of online exclusives. Here’s a sampling to whet your appetite.

In textbook fashion
Robin DeRosa didn’t set out to be a champion of open education. Her Ph.D. is in early American literature, focusing on the 1400s to the 1800s. But there’s something notable about the writing in that time period: It is all freely available in the public domain.

DeRosa noticed she was assigning an expensive required anthology for her classes, but that most of the texts she assigned from the anthology had been published centuries ago and so were actually available for free in the public domain. So she decided to do something about that.

DeRosa – who spoke at St. Norbert’s annual T3 (Transformative Teaching & Technology) Conference – sent out a call to students to create a new free textbook, together. When it came time for this summer project, DeRosa had 10 collaborators – some alums, some current students. They researched, and copied and pasted and, cooperatively, through a grant supplied by DeRosa herself, cobbled together a free textbook the class could use for the upcoming term.

Simple, right? Done, right? Read more.

In two minutes
All that a St. Norbert education has to offer is presented in a new video aimed at prospective students beginning their college search. Watch the video.

In touch
Carol Bruess ’90 discusses the daily communication practices that help create healthy lives, communities, marriages, families and friendships. Carol is the wife of President Brian Bruess ’90. Watch the video.

In tooth and claw
The Hispaniolan solenodon is one of the world’s few venomous mammals. It features, along with our own solenodon expert Adam Brandt (Biology), in the new Netflix series “72 Dangerous Animals Latin America.” Watch the video.

In the hall of fame
Samuel Staehling ’20 is the first student-athlete at St. Norbert to achieve first-team CoSIDA Academic All-America status as a sophomore. His performance on the football field and in the classroom has already been unparalleled in school history. Read more.

April 5, 2018

Also in Print

When a mechanical failure with their homemade submarine lost four children their chance to practice at the YWCA pool, they turned to Dad. Luckily, Dad (of team member Graham) is Jon Russel (Chemistry), so the kids were able to find time at the new campus pool. Their robotics team is building a submarine that can compete by moving through an underwater obstacle course. “Fair warning,” says Russel, “if their sub is failing they could be a little edgy.”