With financial support from the Ministry of Advanced Education, Skills and Training, BCcampus is distributing grants to institutions and faculty members for the development of open educational resources in marketing, with the goal of creating OER that will contribute to the possibility of a Zero Textbook Cost (ZTC) program in marketing.
Post by BCcampus’ editorial team
We are pleased to award grants to four projects that will move us closer to this goal through the creation and adaptation of OER in the following subject areas:
- Consumer behaviour
- Marketing plan development
- Digital marketing
- Principles of marketing
Andrea Niosi, Kwantlen Polytechnic University, Faculty of Business Instructor
“Consumer behaviour examines the perceptions, motivations, attitudes and behaviours of consumers in various purchasing and decision-making contexts. Much of the content and theories adapted to consumer behaviour are rooted in psychology, anthropology, and sociology. This open textbook project will take a less conventional look at consumer behaviour by closely examining the relationship between marketing and culture. This project intends to demonstrate to business students that marketing is a responsibility that should be done with care and consideration. The content highlights social justice themes that pertain to advertising and marketing, including sustainable and responsible consumption, production, and disposal options; anti-consumerism, materialism, and compulsive consumerism; ethnic, racial, gender identity, and generational subcultures; and unethical and manipulative marketing practices such as green/pink washing, stereotyping, cultural appropriation, and gender archetypes. This open textbook aims to identify how marketers perpetuate harm and how the next generation of marketers can avoid it completely and still flourish in their profession.”
Rochelle Grayson, Langara College, Marketing Management Department Chair and Educational Technology Advisor
“As an instructor who has been teaching digital marketing for over 10 years, I look forward to working with a diverse team of Langara experts and specialists to create compelling, open, inclusive, and versatile digital marketing resources that will both support and reflect the ever-changing environment of digital marketing. Not only will these open educational resources (OER) encourage creative instruction and dialogue, but they will also provide an online platform for digital marketing instructors and learners across B.C. to share the latest innovations, critiques, and issues in the field. It’s an exciting time to be teaching and learning in the digital marketing space, and I look forward to the ongoing conversations and discoveries these open resources will spark!”
Michael Orwick, Okanagan College, School of Business Instructor
“We used an open textbook (Principles of Marketing) last year and found that — while it saved the students money — without any support material, it created more work than we could handle because it lacked test banks, PowerPoints, quizzes, videos, flashcards, and such. This investment in creating peripheral material offers a chance to make the open textbook a more valuable tool; one that is flexible and adaptable for each specific class. For our marketing classes, the savings to students for one year would be almost $65,000.”
Mike Walmsley, British Columbia Institute of Technology, School of Business Instructor
“This is a great opportunity to open up and share knowledge. Marketing is often one of the biggest challenges for a business, especially new start-ups. We hope to provide an open educational resource that can help learners gain a better understanding of marketing and suggest practical solutions for the problems that arise when developing a marketing plan so that businesses may achieve success. Chad Flinn and I are excited to be taking on this project and are especially thankful for all the support we have received from BCIT!”
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“We are looking forward to working with these passionate educators on their projects that will contribute to filling gaps in available OER for marketing programs. Each project has the potential to save students tens of thousands in textbook costs and will provide relevant and adaptable resources in a field that is dynamic and ever-changing.” – Melanie Meyers, Project Manager for Business/STEM Zero Textbook Cost Programs and Improved Searchability, BCcampus