We have a lot!
First, we’re very pleased to announce a strategic partnership with VitalSource, the world’s leading learning delivery network. This represents is a big vote of confidence in our work and provides a path to improving OS services in a variety of ways in the years to come. It’s also a significant step for VitalSource into the world of open data and open educational resources, which have been at the core of Open Syllabus’s work.
What does strategic partnership mean? In short, it means that VitalSource will provide financial and technical support to Open Syllabus and become the primary commercial path for accessing premium versions of OS services like Analytics. Open Syllabus remains an independent nonprofit organization and will continue to pursue its mission of supporting curricular research, archiving curricular data, and building teaching and learning services.
What changes for regular users? Nothing. Analytics, the Galaxy, and the Course Matcher will continue to provide access to most data and services for free.
What changes for subscribing institutions? Open Syllabus services become better – drawing on resources that go beyond those of what has been, over the past five years, a four-person team.
With VitalSource’s support, Open Syllabus can continue to grow into what we’ve wanted it to be: the global archive for curricular information and core infrastructure for higher education.
Second, we’ve released a new version of the Analytics dataset.
The new dataset (Version 2.13 for those counting) adds six million new syllabi, bringing the total to 27.6 million and representing the single largest increase in OS history. It updates and expands the range of discoverable titles and incorporates a range of improvements to data quality.
Third, we will be releasing a research dataset with seven and a half million syllabi representing eight years of the OS syllabus collection (2010-2017). This dataset will be available to academic researchers and nonprofit organizations -- with more information to come.
And there is more in the pipeline for the next months. It's an exciting time for Open Syllabus and we hope you'll stay tuned.