In “Open Education and Systemic Change,” Stephen Marshall suggests that universities in New Zealand need to undertake a substantial, system-wide change as the “degree education market is essentially in stasis and shows very little evidence of either innovation generating new options for students” (111). Although many people point to open education and Open Educational Resources (OER) as a potential cure for systemic issues, Marshall is not optimistic about this possibility. Namely, he argues that since New Zealand universities are largely dependent on government funding (66% of their funding is national) they are able to stifle innovative open education initiatives that arise in different industries in the country. He is upfront about his opinion on this position: “Legally the universities are a collective monopoly at present and they should be using that actively to move faster and more efficiently than external players, drawing collectively on skills and resources, instead of depending upon a perpetual protection from others while inefficiently competing amongst themselves” (115). Marshall does not comment, however, on any in-roads that may already have been made by extant open education initiatives and practitioners.

Work cited
Marshall, Stephen. 2012. “Open Education and Systemic Change.” On the Horizon 20 (2): n.p.