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FSEC opens book on rising cost of texts
By MARY COCHRANE
Contributing Editor
After tracking a small sampling of 15 UB students on Facebook.com, the undergraduate Student Association estimates that students can save up to $105 per semester—or $210 per year—buying used rather than new textbooks.
Yet, UB students still pay an average of between $600 and $700 per semester on textbooks, new or used, M. Viqar Hussain, SA president, told the Faculty Senate Executive Committee yesterday.
The rising cost of college textbooks is a problem that exists on campuses across the nation. Melvyn R. Churchill, professor of chemistry, said that "the freshman chemistry textbook alone is about $160; that lasts for about two semesters." But the publisher issues a new edition every three years, and would like to do so every two years, he added.
Here in New York, a bill that establishes a textbook pricing and access act, aimed at decreasing textbook costs—as well as restricting "new and unseemly packaging tactics," better known as bundling—has slowed on its journey through the state Legislature due to revisions.
"I know there is tremendous interest among the legislators to do something," said Peter Nickerson, chair of the Faculty Senate.
In the meantime, SA has taken up the issue of textbook pricing and asked the FSEC for its help in reducing the ever-heavier financial burden students face each school year. Resourceful students sometimes can find lower prices on used textbooks when they buy them at campus bookstores, on eBay or other Web sites, or from each other. But those go quickly.
How can faculty help?
In several ways, according to Hussain, who was joined in the presentation by Michael E. Ryan, vice provost and dean of undergraduate education.
Posting information as widely and as early as possible on which textbooks will be used in coming semesters is the first step professors can take to help keep costs down.
"If a student knows the book is going to be used beforehand, if the professor announces it, then the student is apt to go out and buy the book from eBay or other online sites or from a student who took the class last semester," Hussain said.
Posting their syllabi online is the easiest way to accomplish this, Ryan said.
"One of the things we have done is encourage faculty to put each course syllabus on line. We have something like 187 courses that are online. Through that vehicle, students can go through MyUB or whatever to see what the textbook is going to be and then be able to search on the Internet or other sources to look for the best price they can get."
However, UBLearns, the university's BlackBoard CourseInfo course management system, has been especially slow this semester and all students may not know how to navigate online to find a posted syllabus, cautioned Barbara Rittner, associate dean for student affairs in the School of Social Work.
In response, William H. Baumer, professor of philosophy, walked his fellow senators through the process of setting up a listserv for each class, which he said is the way to "get the word out to your students."
Students' email addresses are included in course rosters, according to Baumer, who said compiling those addresses into a listserv is done easily.
"If you go to the listserv webpage in the CIT section, you can find a procedure that permits you to load every student in the course onto that listserv with essentially a couple keystrokes. You do not have to retype their names and all that jazz. You then have a listserv that is limited to the students in the course and you can use that to send them textbook information," he said. "It works reasonably well as a way to notify students and keep them apprised."
James Faran, associate professor of mathematics, suggested that other departments do what the math department has done in the past: ask for a discount.
Faran said the math department has entered into "hard negotiations with publishers" about text prices, telling them "if you want us to use your calculus books, give us a break," a technique that works best for large-enrollment classes, but not for his smaller graduate course that has only six students.
And School of Dental Medicine students may rent DVDs containing "over 100" required textbooks, according to Peter G. Bradford, associate professor of pharmacology, toxicology and oral biology. He acknowledged that the rental cost is high—about $1,500—but the actual cost of the texts themselves would run much higher.
Ryan suggested other ways faculty can keep costs down are by being reluctant to change the textbooks they use and not too eager to adopt new editions of old textbooks.
"I think faculty should be cautious about changing to a new edition, unless there is a sound reason," he said. "I think most faculty are sympathetic to this issue."
H. William Coles III, assistant vice provost for the Educational Opportunity Program, added that many faculty members who choose to use new editions are able to let students know if older editions still are acceptable for the course.
"They'll indicate that even if there is a new edition out, editions five and four are still adequate," he said.