Congratulations to Gerardina Martin, Zachary Wooten, and Spencer Camacho, who are faculty in the Honors College and participants in the Teaching & Learning Center’s eTextbook Initiative, for completing their new electronic textbook Interdisciplinary Adventures: Navigating the Honors Experience. Their book, which replaces four commercial textbooks that cost $53, will be provided to WCU students for free and used in multiple honors (HON) courses.
As they describe, “The book accompanies honors students through their educational journey, leading them through their honors curriculum. The roadmap helps them navigate their academic and personal development, providing them with key milestones along the way. The books moves from the Symposium and Crossroads, through Launchpad and Capstone, up to Graduation and beyond with stepping stones along the way to stop and reflect on the learning outcomes of each course. The pillars of honors education, including Leadership, Sustainability, Ethical Decision-Making, Social Change, and Community Engagement are followed by reflection questions to promote critical thinking and apply theory and course outcomes to areas of their future lives. The authors provide additional resources and references students can refer to all in one place. Additionally, the text replaces books students would normally need to purchase for at least two of their courses. The authors have vowed to consider additional free resources for students to utilize in courses related to the concepts in the text, so students will not need to buy expensive textbooks. Interdisciplinary Adventures: Navigating the Honors Experience can be used as a model for other honors colleges to help their students become positive change agents in their communities and beyond.”
The eTextbook Initiative was founded in 2017 as a way to help combat the rising costs of textbooks by teaching WCU faculty how to build their own high-quality, interactive electronic textbooks. These textbooks are then provided to WCU students for free, helping to lower the overall cost of their education while removing the financial barrier to obtaining these educational materials. If you are a WCU faculty member who is interested in building their own eTextbook, please contact Marc Drumm, Senior Instructional Designer, at mdrumm@wcupa.edu.
