What’s next in Open Education? That’s the question posed to me for this post. First, let’s recap what we already have in the Open Education movement: 

• Open textbooks & Zero Textbook Costs  - check

• Open pedagogy - check

• Open universities - semi-check - available in some parts of the world, but not widely adopted

• Open libraries - check

• Open professional journals - check

• Open publishing - check

• Open assessment - semi-check, not widely used or available

• Open artificial intelligence - check, in appearance, but only semi-check for accuracy 

• Open tutoring - hmmmm??? And what about open individualized tutoring?

I’m going to focus this post on open individualized tutoring, what parts we already have, and what parts I dream about. 

When ChatGPT gave me an incorrect answer to both the probability problem and a college physics question, I think the reason is that ChatGPT pulls from verbiage that has been uploaded. In technical disciplines, we also have to apply logic, reasoning, symbolic manipulation, and calculation. In non-technical fields, the answers are more thorough and useful. 

Let’s imagine and dream about a future with open individualized tutoring. Suppose we have a class of 40 students with different backgrounds, interests, and competencies. Students might be doing their homework at 2:00 AM, most likely a time when tutoring centers are closed and instructors are not available for consultation. A student presses a chipped device (about half the size of a credit card) against their forehead. Then they tap their computer with the device and the computer instantly knows the student’s strengths and gaps in the course. An individualized learning program, complete with tutoring and formative assessments, is developed for that student. The student would not need to waste their time on concepts they already know. Instead, they would work on the content they don’t know… and only until they have mastered the material.

Does this sound far-fetched and maybe a bit crazy? Maybe it is. But part of this open individualized tutoring is already occurring. ChatGPT works pretty well for literature and social science classes, along with topics that require only memorization. MathGPT is almost 100% accurate for individualized tutoring for OpenStax STEM texts. It has a patient, accurate way of explaining concepts. What about the chipped hardware? When I was a child, the only way to take a person’s temperature was to stick a thermometer into one of two bodily openings. Now, there are devices we can just point at a person, and their temperature displays, almost like a scene out of “Star Trek” from my childhood. 

A few weeks ago, I watched a TED Talk in which a friend of mine swallowed a Pillbot and a video game controller moved it around his body to give the same results that a surgical endoscopy gives. That product sounds as improbable as the chipped device I dream of. However, we need to keep dreaming of future ways to open the world, especially the world of education. We’re not “done” with the Open Movement. We’re waiting for the next breakthrough. Keep dreaming. Maybe my dream will happen… and maybe yours, too.     

Dr. Illowsky is co-author of groundbreaking statistics textbooks published by OpenStax, the first of which is considered the first open, accessible textbook in the U.S. She has served on the international Board of Directors for the OpenEducation Consortium (now Open Education Global). Dr. Illowsky has been a mathematics and statistics professor at De Anza College since 1989. She is a past president of several organizations, including the California Mathematics Council, Community Colleges. She has been on loan to many projects, including the CCC Chancellor’s Office and the CCC Online Education Initiative as its Chief Academic Affairs Officer. Dr. Illowsky was the inaugural OER and Innovation Fellow for the Michelson 20MM Foundation. She spends her days advocating for and promoting adoption of OER/ZTC and mentoring colleges on their paths to reducing textbook costs for students and increasing success in mathematics programs.