Proposal

People often joke about how little money college students have and it’s sad, but true nonetheless. Even community college students, who have considerably lower tuition, still have to dole out quite a lot of money, especially for books. I have never met a student who found book prices to be reasonable and with the current economic crisis, things are getting worse. Students utilize many options to get around this, but there needs to be a solution.
On average I pay about $500 for books per semester, that’s more than my phone bill or the cost of a new computer, and more than the price of a course at some community colleges. It seems that every semester or two a new edition of a book is published or professors change texts. I’ve also had the unfortunate experience of having to buy a book written by a professor. When these book changeovers occur, students must get new copies, since used ones don’t yet exist. Some teachers will only give a book title and leave the edition number to your discretion. While this provides a great opportunity to buy used books it also causes a great deal of confusion amongst students when they are given an assignment on page 96 and it’s 3 different topics in 3 different editions. There are also problems in selling back books in order to afford new books. A bookstore might sell you a book at their full price and only give you a miniscule percentage back for it and then sell it to another student for double what they gave you for it. They also might give you little to nothing if a new edition is being used.
“As the end of the semester rapidly approaches, students are contemplating what to do with their hulking pile of textbooks. Should they sell them back to the bookstore, keep them or donate them to charity?Senior David Conteh has accumulated dozens of expensive books from the past two semesters - spending hundreds of dollars - but due to the realities of low-pay back, has hung on to most of them.Conteh said he has spent almost $800 in the past on books, often because he said his chemistry and biology books are especially expensive.‘Some individual books cost me $100 and above (and) when I try to sell it back, sometimes they say they're changing the edition and they'll buy it back for next-to-nothing or they won't buy it at all,’ Conteh said. ‘So I've kept most of them.’”
(Source: from the online edition of Cardinal Points, the student newspaper of Plattsburgh State University College.)

My solution proposal is to join forces as students. By holding a student trade and sell day before the start of classes and during the first week of each semester and working with professors to eliminate the number of books or changing of editions I believe we could save many people a lot of money. By also using eBooks, or online copies of text material, not only could we save money, but we could save some trees. It would also be a great help if professors reevaluated their syllabi and tried to limit their lessons to as few texts as possible.
Many classes update editions or have you buy workbooks or supplemental materials and the like, which many students never use. I had a biology class in which the professor made us buy a textbook as well as a workbook she and some colleagues had published. It was obviously in her best financial interest to sell more copies, but many students did not use it, myself included. This was because almost no assignments called for it, it was mostly there as a guide. Yet there we were, 20 some odd students with a $40 workbook in mint condition. If only one copy of the book were purchased and only the necessary pages photocopied, we could have all saved some money. This also brings into play the concept of online textbooks. While some websites host this, it is, dismally, another fee. If universities purchased rights to these books and sold cheap passes to students for annual use the school would still make money, but students would also save a great deal. The most practical solution, I feel is to instate a few days the week before and during the first week of each semester for students to be able to trade and sell their books to other students for reasonable prices. Since online purchasing can often be unreliable or delayed, this would provide a great opportunity for both sides. Students would get to see the actual condition of the books at purchase time, negotiate prices, and those selling would make more than the bookstore would give them. Unfortunately, somewhere along the lines someone will have to take on the burden of full priced textbooks. I see it like buying a car. You can buy them used, but in good condition, but someone has to buy the new ones for you to get your deal later, and eventually you have to upgrade to the newest model, but you can put if off for a while until the old model becomes obsolete. I don’t feel too bad for the publishing companies since they would still be making money. According to The Montage (the paper for St. Louis Community College –Meramac) “According to the Government Accountability Office, in 2005, textbook prices outpaced inflation 2 to 1 in the past 20 years. The price of textbooks has increased twice as fast as the value of the dollar.”
If students everywhere use their right to assembly, we can fight the rising costs of textbooks.










Sources:
Crugnale, James . "Many students upset over low buy-back rate from textbooks." Cardinal Points 20 April 2007 3 Nov 2008 .

Barker, Luke. "Digital Textbooks: a cheap alternative in today's overpriced education." The Montage 2 October 2008 3 Nov 2008 .