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K-State Today

August 13, 2012

Professor's collaborative flexbook nominated for national people's choice award

Submitted by Communications and Marketing

People's Choice Awards Most Open Resource Nominee logoBrian Lindshield, assistant professor of human nutrition, is gaining attention for creating a textbook replacement -- called a flexbook -- that saves students money and provides professors with teaching flexibility. His flexbook is one of three nominees for an Education-Portal.com People's Choice Award for "Most Open Resource."

Instead of buying a textbook, students in Lindshield's human nutrition course use a flexbook titled "Kansas State University Human Nutrition (HN 400) Flexbook," which is free for students to use. A flexbook is an open collaborative platform for open course materials. Lindshield created the flexbook to help students save money on course materials and to help students and instructors gain access to rapidly changing information.

To meet students' various learning styles, Lindshield created four ways to share the flexbook with his students: through Google Docs, a Web link, a PDF posted on K-State Online or a print copy that students can either get from a copy center or print themselves. Students do not have to choose only one of the four ways, and the majority of them access the flexbook in multiple ways, Lindshield said.

"Instructors can customize flexbooks to match what they teach," Lindshield said. "The collaborative nature of flexbooks means that instructors of similar courses or members of professional societies can work together to make a base flexbook, then each instructor can make a customized flexbook off of that for their course."

To view the flexbook, visit goo.gl/vOAnR.

For more information about the People's Choice Award, visit eduport.al/PMydv1.

To vote for Lindshield's flexbook to receive the People's Choice Award, click the icon above or visit eduport.al/PKKBf6.

Voting closes Aug. 31.