This Open Education Week (OEW), I attended a presentation by Senior Lecturer Dr Amara Atif (Faculty of Engineering and Information Technology), launching her new book Decoding Data: A Complete Guide to Business Intelligence.
As a Learner Experience Strategist here at UTS I’ve worked on and participated in many business intelligence projects. Despite my experience in these projects, I don’t have a technical background in this field – so when I saw the announcement of the launch of an open education recourse about the area I was naturally interested. I like to proclaim that I am a lifelong learner with the self motivation and regulation to always learn new things, especially on the job.
Seeing the launch of a localised Australian Business intelligence book is a golden opportunity for students thinking about getting into BI, as well as professionals who accidentally find themselves in this type of work in the Australian context. The book has so much to offer being open, practical and accessible for all learners (you can learn more about the importance of this from this talk by David Wiley, starting at timestamp 6:08).
A resource that aligns to the goals of UTS
What is truly admirable is the generosity and good will of people like Dr Amara Atif and all the collaborators that make these resources possible. One can easily see the alignment and valuable contribution of an Open Educational Resource publication towards the UTS 2030 strategic priorities of “A connected and engaged university” and “A student-centred university”.
One of the strengths of this textbook is its focus on Australian case studies and business scenarios. These examples help you see how concepts apply in familiar, real-world contexts, rather than just in theory.
Dr Amara Atif, Decoding Data: A Complete Guide to Business Intelligence
One of the key strengths of OERs is their adaptability. Amara leveraged this to develop BI case studies that students can relate to and engage with real-world contexts in meaningful ways. These case studies, selected for their relevance to the Australian context, help students understand how data is used to provide insights that support business decisions.
The challenges of creating OERs
In her presentation, Amara shared some of the challenges she encountered when setting out to create this valuable resource. She detailed the following:
- Recognition and academic workload
- OER work is often invisible labour and not formally recognised. UTS OEW is an important outlet for recognising this work and the Open Education champions who continue it (hear more about this in Annette Dowd’s OEW blog).
- Amara highlighted multiple roles that she had to manage (academic, author, and editor responsibilities; coordinating content, reviewing, and maintaining consistency). She was able to manage the workload through collaboration, whether internally with UTS Library or externally with other universities. However, writing an open textbook requires effort comparable to any other form of knowledge production in higher education.
- It would greatly benefit from institutional support due to a significant investment of time, energy, and commitment, yet this work often goes unrecognised.
- Resourcing limitations
- No dedicated funding or grants, developed alongside teaching load – sources can include time, release from non-urgent duties, grants, etc.
- The need to independently learn new tools such as H5P, and utilise hosting platforms such as UTS ePress and Pressbooks can be demanding. The CAUL OER Collective published over 70 open textbooks, funded more than $100k in projects, and built strong sector-wide capability, with participation peaking at 91%. It enabled cross-institutional collaboration, addressed textbook gaps, and achieved international recognition. However, the CAUL Board’s decision to retire the OER Collective as a service on 31 December 2025 leaves a significant gap in the sector that will need to be addressed.
- Capability building and community
- Writing an open textbook for an online platform requires instructional design skills. The means that Amara needed to develop further skills in developing accessible content, digital text formatting and quality standards.
- Working in isolation as limited collaboration or no formalised CoP within the faculty or at the institutional level.
Supporting open practices at UTS
Amara’s journey is a tangible example to how open education has the potential to enhance the student learning experience. However, the barriers that Amara highlighted for us need to be addressed for higher educational institutions to realise those benefits. For our learning and teaching community, we need to harness our creativity and advocacy for open education and start thinking about practical solutions to support academics who are striving about better learning and teaching experience.
Make sure to check out new open educational resources like Amara’s book, and come along to events like OEW to connect with the community.