STAND. COM. REP. NO. 2211

Honolulu, Hawaii

RE: S.B. No. 2328

S.D. 1

Honorable Ronald D. Kouchi

President of the Senate

Twenty-Ninth State Legislature

Regular Session of 2018

State of Hawaii

Sir:

Your Committee on Higher Education, to which was referred S.B. No. 2328 entitled:

"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO THE UNIVERSITY OF HAWAI‘I,"

begs leave to report as follows:

The purpose and intent of this measure is to, beginning with the 2020-2021 school year, require all courses at all campuses within the University of Hawai‘i system that require the use of instructional materials to exclusively use instructional materials from the open educational resources at the University of Hawai‘i, under certain conditions.

Your Committee received testimony in support of this measure from the Associated Students of the University of Hawai‘i – Hawai‘i Community College. Your Committee received testimony in opposition to this measure from the University of Hawai‘i System, University of Hawai‘i Professional Assembly, Manoa Faculty Senate Executive Committee, Oahu County Committee on Legislative Priorities of the Democratic Party of Hawai‘i, and numerous individuals.

Your Committee finds that the cost of attending college continues to rise. According to the College Board, the cost of tuition and fees for attending an in-state public college for the 2017-2018 academic year averaged $9,970, while the average cost for books and supplies for the same academic year at public colleges averaged $1,250. Despite Hawaii's overall high affordability ranking according to a study in 2016 by the Institute for Research on Higher Education at the University of Pennsylvania Graduate School of Education, attending college was a big expense for families earning less than $30,000 annually and the State's financial aid policies did little to alleviate costs for these families. Therefore, new and innovative solutions need to be implemented to lower other costs associated with attending school within the University of Hawai‘i system.

Your Committee further finds that since 2015, open educational resources at the University of Hawai‘i has offered free instructional materials to potentially lower the cost of higher education, provide faculty more control over their instructional materials, and enable new ways of learning for students. Specifically, open educational resources offers learning, teaching, and research resources that are either in the public domain or have been released with an intellectual property license that permits free reuse and repurposing. Through faculty use of open educational resources since its adoption, this technology-driven instructional content has saved students hundreds of thousands of dollars in textbook costs.

Your Committee further finds that, after noting the concerns of numerous testimony from University of Hawai‘i faculty, it will always be the right of the faculty to teach their courses in the best manner that they see fit and that faculty are the experts in curriculum development and pedagogy. However, your Committee wants to provide support to faculty who are interested in lowering costs for students in higher education by using open educational resources in their classrooms.

Your Committee has amended this measure by deleting its contents and inserting language that:

(1) Establishes the University of Hawai‘i open educational resources task force to conduct a comprehensive analysis and evaluation on all general education courses and high attendance courses taught at the University of Hawai‘i system to identify open educational resources for those courses;

(2) Establishes and appropriates funds for an open educational resources pilot project grant program to incentivize faculty that adopt, develop, and implement open educational resources; and

(3) Requires the University of Hawai‘i open educational resources task force to report its findings and recommendation initiatives for supporting and expanding the use of open educational resources at the University of Hawai‘i to the Legislature prior to the Regular Session of 2019.

As affirmed by the record of votes of the members of your Committee on Higher Education that is attached to this report, your Committee is in accord with the intent and purpose of S.B. No. 2328, as amended herein, and recommends that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as S.B. No. 2328, S.D. 1, and be referred to your Committee on Ways and Means.

Respectfully submitted on behalf of the members of the Committee on Higher Education,

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KAIALI'I KAHELE, Chair