According to the educational consultant who was also the main instructional designer, the Information Literacy module lasts approximately seventy hours, whilst the Knowledge Deepening module lasts approximately ninety hours. If one compares the cost of this development with the notional figures provided in the previous section, there is a clear indication that the approach of building a course using existing content is significantly more cost-effective. In Guyana, it took seventy-six days (or 608 hours) to produce 160 hours of learning (of which eighty are effectively text- or print-based and eighty are computer-based instruction). The following table compares Swift’s estimates of time to design one notional student hour of learning with the actual time taken to develop the Guyana materials.
| Media |
Swift’s notional estimate of time required to produce material equivalent to one notional hour of learning |
Actual hours taken to develop one notional learning hour of material |
| Print |
20-100 hours |
3.8 hours |
| Computer-based instruction |
200-300 hours |
3.8 hours |
- Comparing the Guyana design with Swift’s notional estimates
However, as these estimates are for distance education course development whereas the Guyana courses are a blended learning design, it is possibly more useful to compare the costs with the notional estimates from Bryan Chapman. The result is no less startling.
| Media |
Chapman’s notional estimate of time required to produce material equivalent to one notional hour of learning |
Actual hours taken to develop one notional learning hour of material |
| Instructor-led training (ILT), including design, lesson plans, handouts, PowerPoint slides, etc. |
34 hours |
3.8 hours |
| Standard eLearning, which includes presentation, audio, some video, test questions, and 20% interactivity |
22 hours |
3.8 hours |
- Comparing Guyana design with Chapman’s notional estimates
These figures do not indicate an even greater cost saving, as the time reflected also includes the development of content based on international examples (i.e., not Guyana-specific and containing more generic content). Thus, the outcomes of the project were eight versions of content. These are:
- Guyana Pre-service Information Literacy module (print version and CD version)
- Guyana In-service Information Literacy module (print version and CD version)
- Guyana Pre-service Knowledge Deepening Module (print version and CD version)
- Guyana In-Service Knowledge Deepening Module (print version and CD version)
- International Pre-service Information Literacy module (print version and CD version)
- International In-service Information Literacy module (print version and CD version)
- International Pre-service Knowledge Deepening Module (print version and CD version)
- International In-Service Knowledge Deepening Module (print version and CD version)
As all of this content is being shared under an open license, the potential for achieving economies of scale grows further as and where it is used by other institutions. Already, the material is being adapted for use in countries as diverse as St. Vincent and the Grenadines and in Indonesia, where it is being redeployed with marginal redevelopment time required to contextualise the materials effectively.
It is important to note that, in this case, a key contributor to cost reduction was that the leader of the team was multi-skilled and thus able to serve several functions. The education consultant in this instance served multiple roles: as an instructional designer, graphic and Web designer, workshop facilitator and general editor. Traditionally, such functions have tended to be spread across multiple people, raising costs. This kind of multi-tasking has been facilitated by the growing access to content development tools provided by ICT, but does also suggest that effective economic use of OER for course design and development does require highly-skilled designers to work successfully.
