We are excited to announce today that we will be extending the Wave II deadline of our Open Textbook Challenge! Yes, you heard that right: we’ve decided to push back our Wave II deadline to May 31, 2012.

There are a few reasons why we felt prospective OTC candidates should have some extra time to prepare their submissions. First, we’ve made a couple of changes to the submission criteria– which have been revised on the Open Textbook Challenge website.

Also, we’re making a huge announcement January 31st: the accepted texts from Wave 1! We figured that potential entrants – and individuals who are unsure if their works are appropriate – might appreciate the opportunity to review a sampling of texts that were eligible for the award.

And finally, word of Saylor’s work and mission are spreading across the globe. Keeping that in mind, we added a couple extra months to this Wave to ensure that professors around the globe have ample time to prepare high-quality submissions!

Is this the first time you’re hearing about the Open Textbook Challenge? Let me fill you in:

Our goal with the Open Textbook Challenge is to encourage college textbook authors and professors to openly license their works under a CC-BY license in exchange for a $20,000 award. Submitted texts must align with one of the eligible courses on Saylor.org and will be subject to a peer-review before it is awarded with the $20,000 prize. Once accepted, these texts will be hosted on Saylor.org – as well as many other open education sites – freely accessible to students and educators, worldwide!

We’re even offering opportunities for students and friends of professors! If you haven’t written a textbook or multiple course packs that could be eligible for our Challenge, but know someone who has, listen up. We’re also offering $250 referral bounties for individuals who refer an accepted textbook author or professor to the Open Textbook Challenge. Simply generate a referral code here, and pass it along!

So, be sure to check out the official Open Textbook Challenge webpage – and read what Jeff Davidson, our Strategic Initiatives Manager, had to say about the Challenge when it was launched.

 

The image “Junior Year” used in this post came from Flickr user Amanda_Munoz and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution license.