A growing attention to the ownership of materials created by teachers may alter dot.com business plans

Internet Strategies for Education Markets: The Heller Report, March, 2001

Thomson Learning's plans for Universitas 21, a consortium of universities offering online courses in partnership with Thomson (see ISEM, December, 2000), have recently been slowed by five faculty unions asking to first resolve some academic and employment issues. Among those issues are questions about ownership of materials that professors create. It is one illustrative case of online companies needing business plans that account for increased individual awareness and union activity related to intellectual property issues.

The Internet, of course, began as a tool for the free exchange of academic information, and it has largely remained so. But with the growth of distance learning and the commoditization of education, higher education professors and institutions -- as well as K-12 teachers and districts -- are taking a closer look at the ownership of digital learning goods.

Higher Education Takes the IP Lead

The change is most apparent in higher education, where, according to a survey by Coursemetric (www.coursemetric.com, Berkeley, CA), 90% of institutions have a specific policy related to online course ownership. The same survey found that most institutions of higher education see content as the property of the instructor, but more than half indicate that the institution owns the course as a whole.

Faculty unions are also beginning to address the issue. A two-year-old, smoothly running agreement at MOTT Community College in Michigan (see www.mccea.org/intelprop.html), for example, addresses ownership of distance learning courses. When the faculty member is compensated for creating a course, the agreement assigns ownership of the completed course package to the institution. The faculty member, however, continues to own all notes and materials used in creating the course.

The contract also includes provisions such as giving the creating faculty member first right of refusal for teaching the course, payment structures for the sales of accompanying study guides created by the faculty member, and required compensation for when the creating faculty member consults with somebody else who will be teaching the course.

All this adds up to an environment in which web sites buying or otherwise collecting materials created by professors must be cautious. Academic.com (Mountain View, CA), for example, always clears rights for content in their Active Content Library with both the contributing professor, and the institution. These contributions are comparable to roughly a subchapter in a textbook, and so they are not always covered by guidelines for a distance learning course or individual components of a course. In fact, Academic.com's confirmation of ownership has so frequently unveiled misunderstandings on campus that they now offer a seminar to help institutions define intellectual property issues.

The Endangered K-12 Non-issue

Currently, K-12 districts handle ownership of items such as tests, lesson plans or learning animations as a non-issue. The occasional district will clarify the ownership of a complete online course as work-for hire.

Cyndie Jacks, a former elementary school teacher, started dog-eared resources inc. (Grapevine, TX, www.dogearedresources.com) last year. The subscription site gives access to lesson plans for grade one through four that are created by Jacks, her partner and various part-time employees. They focus sales on new teachers, selling $31.95 annual subscriptions to individuals and site licenses to elementary schools. Jacks started the company as she searched for part-time work to mix with motherhood. In this case, the ownership of the lesson plans created during her employment as a teacher was never questioned. Her principal encouraged her new venture wholeheartedly.

Similarly, companies such as Quia (www.Quia.com, see ISEM, Aug 2000), which posts games that teachers make using their templates, or Teacher Created Materials (www.teachercreated.com), which buys curriculum from teachers, have never encountered disagreements about ownership.

And Generation2l (Golden, CO. www.gen2l.com, see ISEM Jan 2001), which is marketing their knowledge management technology into schools, is relying on the corporate work-for-hire model to shift easily into the new market. So far it has.

That tranquil and profitable scenario, however, is likely to change. It may just be that Internet companies have increased legal bills as they clarify ownership of their content. It may be that business models fall apart as the cost of teacher-created content rises. It may be that IMS meta-data tags solve all the problems. At any rate, we have brought commercialism to the shores of educational web sites.

IP K-12 Bargaining Anticipated

Neither the NEA or AFT are aware of intellectual property rights being. addressed in K-12 bargaining, but they expect them to soon follow the lead of community colleges and other institutions of higher ed. Indeed, one K-12 local in Michigan has requested the model from MOTT Community College.

The NEA does have a clear grasp on how the Internet has changed a teacher's ability to create and disseminate bits of learning, as well as the market's growing valuation of those creations. Cynthia Chmielewski, NEA Staff Counsel, says the organization will be working to make K-12 members aware of why intellectual property guidelines matter, primarily through puffing background materials on their web site.