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Forum addresses textbook issues

Forum-addresses-textbook-issues

Nick Brown | Phoenix Staff

Panel members discussed in a forum on Monday ways that the college could spend $10,000 of rollover funds on textbook buying.

BY LINDA HOU

In print | November 19, 2009

When last year’s Student Council decided to designate $10,000 of the rollover funds for reducing textbook costs, they didn’t realize how little an impact that would have.

“Not much research was done,” Student Council President Rachel Bell ’10 said. “Over the summer, it was realized that this amount of money isn’t even enough to get a semester of books.”

On Monday, Student Council and Class Awareness Month co-hosted a forum to raise student awareness and invite ideas on how to spend the money. However, the turnout was low, with less than a dozen students attending.

“We wanted to make people aware that StuCo’s concerned about textbooks and we wanted to solicit as many ideas as possible,” Student Financial Policy Representative Dan Symonds ’11 said. “It could’ve been better attended.”

During the meeting, Bell suggested three options that Student Council came up with. The first would include a place where students can put old textbooks. StuCo would then store the books over break and loan them to students the next semester at little or no cost. This plan would require little money and would be the easiest to implement.

Two other projects include purchasing more introductory course textbooks to be put on reserve at the library and allotting the money for photocopying textbooks.

Bell said that because many introductory course textbooks are not used beyond a semester, it would make sense for students to want temporary copies of the books.

However, because textbooks are constantly coming out in new editions, money would be quickly depleted.

“The sum of all required books for just the fall semester is over $31,000,” college librarian Peggy Seiden said. “We might need to spend a fraction of that if we were to target those books that are for intro classes, but I have no idea yet what that fraction would be.”

Symonds then suggested using older editions of textbooks at a reduced price. Last year in Introduction to Economics, students were able to purchase their textbooks for a lower rate due to a negotiation between the faculty and the publisher.

Bookstore director Kathy Grace pointed out, however, that it was a special case where that edition of the book was going obsolete, so the publisher was willing to sell the book at a lower price. Grace explained that the college bookstore is already losing money on textbooks because it raises the textbook price by 20 percent on top of the net price instead of the 25 percent industry standard. While the bookstore is expected to make money, she says that the money is made from sweatshirts and other merchandise, not textbooks.

“About three years ago we started losing money on textbooks,” Grace said. “A lot of students would buy the books, order the books online, and then return the books, so we’re paying all the merchant fee on nothing, and those add up.”

Grace also points out that a major problem for the bookstore is that many faculty members do not provide information about required books for their classes until the winter or summer break, making it difficult for the bookstore to find used copies to sell the next year.

“If we know the faculty will use a book the next semester, then we can put a guaranteed buyback sticker on it and the student can buy the book at 75 [percent] and sell it at 50, so they’re only spending 25 on a textbook, which is a pretty good deal,” Grace said.

At the same time, she understands that it may be hard for faculty members who may be unable to decide on books until later for reasons such as the development of a new curriculum.

Biology professor Scott Gilbert said that many new textbooks are sent by publishers late in the semester, preventing the professors from choosing new books until later. Gilbert has written three textbooks himself.

“The reason why textbooks are so expensive is because after the first semester, the used book market kicks in and the publisher, the artist and the writer get nothing,” Gilbert said. “A lot of book publishers also need to put out PowerPoints of all the illustrations of the book because a lot of the professors ask for more than just the book.”

Director of Financial Aid Laura Talbot also emphasized the fact that in considering financial aid, all students were given an allowance of $1,150 for books and expenses. Last year alone the college spent $870,000 in textbook allowances for students.

Symonds and Bell, along with a Class Awareness Month organizer, Kate Aizpuru ’10, moderated the forum. Professors from different departments were also present at the panel.