Initiatives and Information
Textbook affordability
The Office of Instruction and Academic Affairs is committed to providing CSI students an optimal educational experience through instructional excellence and commitment to teaching and learning. Important elements in this experience are the learning resources required, including textbooks, learning systems, tools, and others. Our team is dedicated to balancing the best learning resources available with the cost of those resources. Textbook costs in particular are a growing point of contention. While duly respecting the academic freedom rights of the faculty, there comes a responsibility that the balance between quality and cost is under constant consideration. CSI faculty have done an exemplary job or mitigating these costs through careful textbook adoption: nearly 40% of all course sections have zero or low cost textbooks adopted. But more work is being done.
This document was submitted to the Idaho State Board of Education as a requirement of their Policy III.U. It outlines the current plan for further mitigation of textbook costs for CSI students. In 2021 the Idaho Legislature appropriated $1 million to the four community colleges in the interest of adoption and development of Open Education Resources. This activity is underway and has been entitled Project Z-Degree. CSI acts as the fiscal agent for this statewide project.
AAC&U High Impact Practices (HIP’s)
The Office of Instruction and Academic Affairs is committed to furthering the use of High Impact Practices as defined by the American Association of Colleges and Universities. More information can be found at the AAC&U website.