Purpose and Context
Ventura College’s Zero Textbook Cost (ZTC) and ZEN Initiatives were established to remove financial barriers and promote equity in learning. Within this framework, I led the redesign of CHEM V20 (Lecture + Lab) as part of the Pre-Allied Health Pathway Acceleration Grant. The course serves a wide range of pre-nursing and allied-health students—many of whom face steep textbook and lab-manual costs often exceeding $250. Converting this course to a fully ZTC-compliant format offered a tangible way to address those inequities while improving course design and accessibility. What began as a cost-reduction project evolved into a broader effort to rebuild how students access, interpret, and interact with chemistry materials.
Implementation and Design Process
Before joining the ZEN Program, CHEM V20 already operated in a mostly ZTC format: students used instructor-created slides, worksheets, and free digital lab manuals. However, the ZEN Program required a deeper and more intentional redesign—one that aligned pedagogy, structure, and accessibility.
I reviewed and curated LibreTexts Chemistry and other OER materials to replace all commercial resources, verifying Creative Commons licenses and aligning topics with course SLOs. Lecture materials were rebuilt in Canvas as fully modular weekly units, each including:
- linked LibreTexts readings and open quizzes
- instructor-made slides and guided worksheets
- recorded Zoom lectures with searchable transcripts
Optional Textbook (LibreTexts)
Primary Learning Resource (Instructor Slides)
Zoom Recording of a Lecture
The CHEM V20L (now V101) lab manual was restructured to align with the ZTC goals of cost efficiency, accessibility, and clarity.
It includes reducing total page count, standardizing section order, and introducing consistent headings and tables across all experiments. The layout now supports both digital and print use with a modern, minimal format that reads cleanly on any device.
After its first semester of implementation, several cross-reference and numbering inconsistencies surfaced, prompting a structured quality-control revision planned for Winter 2025.
This follow-up phase focuses on validation, automation, and peer feedback—ensuring the manual remains a reliable, sustainable resource within the department’s broader ZTC framework.
Results and Institutional Integration
By Spring 2025, both CHEM V20 and V20L achieved formal ZTC Pathway 2 approval, satisfying all eight compliance standards: OER usage, accessibility, cost elimination, Canvas integration, and instructor IP ownership.
All materials are now freely available to students and openly licensed where applicable.
Beyond student experience, the project also contributed to Ventura College’s ZTC Acceleration Grant data reporting, helping document Chemistry’s readiness within the Pre-Allied Health pathway.