Textbook Prices
Published on Aug 8, 2006 at 7:02 pm.
22 Comments.
Filed under college teaching.
Well, the emails and phone calls have already started. Students are trying to get hold of me to ask if they need to buy a textbook for the Fall semester. A couple of our classes are getting new textbooks. Unfortunately, they are expensive. So, students want to know if they need to buy them.
These inquiries come in two forms. First, there are the students who want to know if they need a book at all. Second, there are students who already have a book, but it is not the new edition, so they want to know if they need the new edition.
I am really very sympathetic to their plight. I was a student once, and there were a couple of semesters where buying textbooks was just one more expense that was about to break the financial camel’s back. So, I tried to figure out if I need to buy the study guide, the companion book, the optional text, etc. One semester, the total of textbooks and optional texts added up to nearly $400 for just one class!Â
Now, it is even worse. Textbook prices have gone through the roof. The price of books has risen far faster than the adjustment for inflation. Tuition has gone up faster than inflation, too. Sadly, my salary has not gone up faster than inflation, and some years when the state’s budget has been tight it has not kept up with inflation. Many of my students work to pay their way through college. The days when their parents could foot the whole bill are long gone for all but the wealthiest people. Most of the students are taking out student loans, and they are graduating with student loan debts nearly as large as my mortgage. I really feel for them.
So, when they ask if they need the textbook, I know where they are coming from. I know some faculty who select a textbook and hardly use it. They will pick a text that costs $75 and assign readings from only two chapters. Or else, they will pick a $90 lab manual, and then use only 5 labs from the manual, and pass out handouts for the rest. Others will select a text, and then never assign any readings from it, and all their tests come from lecture — they just have a text for students to read on their own if they want to know more. No wonder students want to know if they really need the text.
Well, I assign homework problems from the physics texts. Also, the worked examples and explanations are very important for their learning. The astronomy text also has more information in it that I think is important for them to read, as well as having a CD with computer software containing a program that they have to use to do some homework. So, in my case they need a textbook. But do they need a current edition of the textbook?Â
In most cases, there isn’t much that has changed. Now, for the astronomy textbook, there are sections that have undergone major revision. For example, we know so much more about extrasolar planets, galaxy formation, and comets than we did just a few years ago. Also, spacecraft have visited Saturn, Mars, Jupiter, and Venus in recent years and returned a wealth of data to go into the new textbook editions. So, there has been a lot of change. New textbooks are needed every few years due to the new knowledge. That makes this an exciting field! But, do the new books really need to cost so much more than the old editions?  Why does changing 10% of the textbook mean a 25% increase in price?
The physics books are another matter altogether. There, the material hasn’t changed. Yeah, a lot of research has been done in physics in the last few years, but not much has changed in what we teach first year physics students. There are still only three Newton’s Laws. Coulomb’s Law and Faraday’s Law haven’t changed. Acceleration is still the derivative of velocity, and velocity is still the derivative of position. The speed of light is still the same. The definitions of ”Volt”, “Ampere”,  ”Watt”, and “Joule” have not changed. Work is still change in energy. In fact, the worked examples in the text have hardly changed. A couple of years ago, I compared my course syllabus to one that I had as a freshman some twenty years earlier. We were covering the same material, in the same order, in just about the same week of the semester as I did back then. Looking back through my class notes, I see that I am doing similar examples in class as my prof did back then. The textbooks are the same, too. OK, not exactly the same. The new books have lots of pretty color pictures. My old book had mostly line drawings and black and white photos. The new book is nearly all metric units, my old book was only 2/3 metric units. The new book costs $150. The old book cost $25. Wow. I sure hope my students like those color photos. Other than that, the books cover the same material in the same order, with the same equations, and mostly the same, or similar, worked examples. So, what changes between editions? Well, they reorder the homework problems, add a few, and take a few out. That is 90% of the changes between editions.
So, when students ask me if they need a textbook, I tell them “Yes!” But, when they ask me if they need a current edition, I am not sure what to tell them. I think that they benefit from the current edition of the astronomy texts. But I have doubts if the changes in editions helps them in physics. I assign homework out of the current edition. But, I tell them that they can keep their old edition as long as they make friends with someone in the class and can look at their friend’s book to get the homework problems. Many are the same anyway, just with different numbers. Only a few are entirely new.
 So, what drives the publishers constantly updating editions? Clearly, for the astronomy books, it is at least partly due to the new discoveries. But, for the physics books, it is purely a desire to make money. I can’t fault them for that. After all, this is America, and we are based on a capitalist economy model. So, their making money is a good thing. But, it sure seems like they are taking advantage of the students. They have a captive audience. The students don’t get to shop around for the textbook that they like. The best that they can do is shop around for the cheapest price for a particular book. Some of the ones contacting me now are trying to do just that. They are finding out ISBN’s for the books so that they can order them online. That is perfectly fine with me. I don’t care where they get them.
The textbook publishers insist that they need to constantly come up with new editions to keep making money. When a new edition comes out, they make a bunch of money at first, then less, then nearly none. After a couple of years, there are so many used books available to students that few buy the new books. Well, of course! When books cost less, students wanted nice clean, unmarked, new books. But with the prices so high that textbook prices outpace tuition, then they are looking to save as much money as possible. Then, to afford to buy books for the next semster, they sell back their old books. The used books have value because the new books cost so much. If the new textbook were $50, then the used book would have to be $30 to compete, and so the bookstore would only give a student selling their book perhaps $10. For that, they might want to keep their book. But, when they can get $50 for a used book, what student wouldn’t sell their old book unless it were something for their major? So, it is the price of the textbooks that is driving the used book market. But, the publishers raise their book prices to get more money before the used books take away all their profits. However, the more they raise the price, the bigger the used book market and the quicker that used books take away all the purchases from the new books. It is a vicious cycle.
I try to look at prices when I select a textbook. I seem to be one of the few faculty members who do so. I try to think if we really need a particular textbook. Obviously, the cheapest is not always the best. But, neither is the most expensive. A book coming with lots of do-dads is not best either. I don’t use the publisher’s testbank, nor any of the overheads, or such. So, those things don’t matter to me. The book coming with a CD doesn’t really matter unless I have the students use it. But some faculty just like those bells and whistles.
Something has to give.  I am not sure what is the best way to break this cycle. But, unless something is done, students eventually won’t be able to afford their books. Many are already hurting.Â
-Astroprof
Seeking Solace on August 8, 2006 at 7:36 pm: 1
Love the new look!!!!
Kelly on August 9, 2006 at 4:05 am: 2
I’m not a professor I’m an undergrad, but my mom was a tenured professor, of philosophy and ethics. She too was sensitive to the problem of the rising the cost of books, and was also noticing that her peers didn’t seem to even think about price when choosing books for the courses they taught.
Thanks for caring enough to write about it on your blog.
Sarah on August 10, 2006 at 9:12 am: 3
Hey,
My name is Sarah Deak and I am a college student from the University of Dayton and intern working with ECNext, an e-marketing company. I am helping ECNext spread the word about a great new site for purchasing cheap textbooks, iChapters.com (http://www.ichapters.com).
I came across this post and I thought you might want to take a look at iChapters to help out with the heavy cost of textbooks. iChapters is unique because it not only sells cheap college textbooks, but single chapters of textbooks as well. This is especially nice for classes where only one chapter of a book is assigned because I know I don’t want to spend money on the parts of the book I am not even going to read. Also, iChapters offers the ability to buy e-Texts that can be sent immediately to your computer, getting rid of the hassle of waiting for your books to arrive.
I feel as thought this site would be very useful to your readers and students and I was hoping you could share it with them. If you could write about iChapters or simply add it to a list of your favorite links it would certainly help spread the news about this great new site.
Please look around the iChapters website (http://www.ichapters.com) and feel free to e-mail with any questions or call me at 614-682-5152. As a college student myself, I am quite excited about what iChapters has to offer and I hope you will be too!
Thanks so much!
Sarah Deak (SDeak@ECNext.com)
average professor on August 10, 2006 at 12:23 pm: 4
Many publishers protect us from knowing the costs of the textbooks we select by sending us a review copy free of charge. Wheeee!
But seriously, I am sensitive to this also, so when students ask me if they need to buy the text, and in its newest addition, I say, “Yes*”
(* “How will I know if you don’t? How will I know if you’re just copying the relevant figures and tables from the library’s copy of the textbook, which I have placed on reserve? I won’t. If you are intending to make a career out of this discipline in any way, you will want to buy the textbook because it will be a good reference for you in the future. If you are just here for the joy of having this on your transcript, you can decide how much that is worth to you in terms of textbook dollars.”)
The textbook I use in one particular class was recently revised, and since it was with a new publisher and a new lead author, the look and style was very different. The figures and equations had different numbering conventions, etc. And there were a few much-needed new chapters. The thing that really galls me is that the figures which were repeats from the last edition were just bad scans of the old images . . . complete with grainy pixelated noise and fuzzy text. For $125, I want readable, professional figures.
profgrrrrl on August 12, 2006 at 1:42 pm: 5
I try to be sensitive to the price issue, but sometimes I’m caught in a bind. I do some classes with PDFs, but others — the one where everyone uses the same text (written by someone high up in admin at my U) which costs $80; the one where the only decent text is $100, and it’s the one everyone uses for this baseline course, across universities; the course I supervise with the overpriced and worthless text, but I can’t make changes just yet. Ugh. Hate it.
Astroprof on August 12, 2006 at 3:04 pm: 6
Sometimes the best book is simply expensive. The best introductory physics textbooks, which are used all over the country, are just plain expensive. In the other courses, I try to look at the book price. But watching costs is hard, because the bookstores don’t charge what the texbook reps tell us the price of the book is going to be. And, of course, you often simply need a textbook. But, I really feel bad for how much students pay for overpriced books. I always encourage students to get the books online if they can. That way, they save at least a few dollars. I have a few friends who have taught upper division or graduate classes in which the “text” was a list of journal articles the students had to read. That doesn’t work as well for the core classes or the introductory ones, though.
average professor on August 14, 2006 at 10:52 am: 7
Here’s somebody’s plan for how to deal with this issue. Hmm.
http://insidehighered.com/news/2006/08/14/books
Astroprof on August 14, 2006 at 12:23 pm: 8
Thanks for the link.
The physics faculty here do try to adopt a book and then not change until forced to by a new edition. Most textbook companies are on a three year cycle, but a few go longer between editions. For the intro physics books, they can go nearly 10 years between editions. I have taken to offering more online supplements for the astronomy, and now that I have my own domain, I am thinking of doing more of that.
k8 on August 17, 2006 at 9:07 pm: 9
One thing you can do is put one or two copies on short term reserve at your library. Then, students who can’t afford the book will have access to it. It isn’t perfect, but it can work well for a lot of students.
StyleyGeek on August 18, 2006 at 2:23 am: 10
When I was an undergrad, I would always buy the assigned books for each course — secondhand if I could — even if this meant I had to skimp on ‘luxuries’ like food or heating. The “optional” books, though, I never bought.
Books were something I incorporated into my budget, and when you are paying $6000 or more in fees, fronting up an extra $400 for textbooks is tough, but it doesn’t _feel_ quite so bad if it comes out of the bank account at the same time as fee money.
Nowadays, as a grad student without courses, books are a luxury I really can’t justify. No one is telling me I _need_ to have certain books, and I have access to interlibrary loan to get hold of anything I need to consult. And without the huge fees coming out of my account every semester, a couple of hundred dollars for books is a noticeable blip that I prefer to avoid.
The moral of the story is that all the books from my discipline that I have on my shelves are from undergrad days, and I love them and treasure them. I wouldn’t buy them now, but I am unbelievably glad to own them, and therefore glad that my profs back then chose to assign them and work from them.
Something to consider when choosing texts for courses you teach might be how useful a reference book it will be for the student if they continue on in your field, and how glad they will be to have it in the future. If they have to spend so much on books, they might as well be fundamental texts of the discipline that will last them the rest of their careers.
Paul Gowder on August 18, 2006 at 8:57 am: 11
It seems to me that this might be somewhere that organized action by faculty could just break the system.
Do the faculty who write these textbooks see an economically meaningful amount of royalties on them? I suspect not, and if that’s true, then there’s no reason not to just get a bunch of professors in a given field together, incorporate a nonprofit, everyone takes one chapter, and sell the damn book at cost.
Kristin on August 18, 2006 at 10:23 am: 12
Order and buy the book sell used in ours online-shop!
Joe Alum on August 18, 2006 at 10:46 am: 13
As an undergrad I managed to get through my four years with only purchasing about a half dozen books, most of which were paperbacks under $20.00. Here are some tips for students and professors on how you can do it:
1. Many students work in university offices and have access to the copying machine which most staff assistants allow students to use liberally. As I did, simply purchase copies of the books before classes began, spend an evening photocopying them, alter your schedule to make it show like you dropped the class, and returned the book for a full refund.
2. Many campus libraries have multiple copies of many books professors use in the stacks. By using a creative method involving the use of holds, a few late fees, and rotating the book between classmates, I was able to keep it out most of the semester. If the campus library is out then try the local library and the state interlibrary loan system. If that doesn’t work, most universities will use their interlibrary loan systems to obtain multiple copies (especially of older books).
3. Find a friend or two in class and split the cost of the book. This works especially well when the prof does not regularly use the book.
4. Many profs will put their personal or department review copies on reserve in the library. Many courses I took had 6 or 7 copies of the textbook on reserve, almost always ensuring a copy was available I avoided purchasing so many books, by just doing my reading and studying in the library reserve room. If I needed to take something home, I dropped a few dimes in the library photocopier (far cheaper then paying $150 for the book). My library also had 2 hour reserve check out. If you checked out the book an hour before the reading room closed, you could keep it overnight as long as you returned it no later then an hour after the reading room opened. So I would check it out at 10pm and return it at 8:30am on my way to class.
5. Don’t buy your textbook right away and get a feel for the class. Some professors who assign textbooks ended up never using it and others assign textbooks, find out that they are worthless, and never use them. If you find into the semester that you need the book most university bookstores keep them on hand well into the semester.
6. Get your booklists before the semester starts and look for the book on the web. Sites like Amazon.com can feature the book for substantially less then the campus bookstore. Also, use Ebay and other used book services even if you are looking for a new edition. The textbook companies send out tons of review copies and some savvy reviewers will make a few bucks by selling their review edition for less then the cover price.
7. If you have to buy a new textbook (or even a used one) DON’T SELL IT BACK TO THE BOOKSTORE. They will only give you 15-25% of what you bought it for, then sell it back to another student next semester with a modest 15-25% off the cover price. First, check the schedule to see if the class is being taught again next semester. Then, find out if the same textbook will be used next semester. You can do this by simply asking your instructor after class. On the first day of the next semester, print up some fliers advertising the text book for a price that is about 50-60% of what you paid and post them in the room where the class is being held. You will find that almost immediately after the class ends that potential buyers will be contacting you. So, everyone wins out in the end. You get more money back for your book and the buyer gets a cheaper price then what the bookstore would offer.
I hope this helps.
Rob on August 18, 2006 at 11:24 am: 14
Consider going online for books. Look at MIT’s Open Courseware http://ocw.mit.edu/index.html
CMU’s Open Learning Initiative http://www.cmu.edu/oli/ Wikibooks http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Main_Page
etc.
Astroprof on August 18, 2006 at 12:01 pm: 15
Having a copy of the book on reserve in the library is a good idea.
Also, if students ask, I let them know if an older edition is OK. Frequently they are, and the older editions are far less expensive than the new ones. Sometimes, though, there is significant differences between the editions. In that case, the new edition is needed.
Also, I do make the textbooks known early enough for students to order online. That is almost always cheaper than buying at the bookstore. Sometimes ordering a book at some other bookstore is cheaper,too. The publishers actually seem to charge the college bookstores more than they do the ones that just order one or two of the books. Normally, buying in bulk keeps the cost down, but they know that they’ve got the students over a barrel, so they can charge the college bookstores more and the price will be passed on.
And, yes, I do use the textbook, and I only select books that I think that the students will benefit from having, keeping cost in mind. But, still, it seems that the prices charged are crazy.
A while back, some of us got together and asked a publisher if we could get a book printed only in black and white to save money. That would work for some books, such as the physics textbooks, but not for the astronomy texts, where color matters. Sadly, the strategy didn’t result in a massive savings for the students.
As for writing our own, I’ve been working on a a lab manual. It takes a lot more time than you’d think to write a textbook. For those of us with a heavy teaching load, it is tough.
Mark on August 18, 2006 at 1:17 pm: 16
I attended college in the early ’80s and I took a class from a professor who had been teaching since the ’50s. His course was lecture based. We were expected to outline his lectures in our notebooks. Our notebooks were collected periodically and our outlines were checked. In the professor’s view, textbooks were used by intstructors too lazy to write lectures and to keep up with the changing literature in the field. We were expected to write a long term paper as well so we read many books and journal articles obtained at the library. It is possible to teach a rigorous course without a textbook.
Astroprof on August 18, 2006 at 2:21 pm: 17
I have taught courses without textbooks before. It can be done, if you work hard. But, it is really dependent upon the course. Sometimes, for courses like physics or calculus, you need the extra worked problems and descriptions in the textbook.
allan on August 20, 2006 at 4:45 pm: 18
Have you considered using mass market books as texts?
Some are excellent, and the costs are at a much lower, free market price.
R. Kennedy on August 26, 2006 at 7:49 pm: 19
Man, this is excellent. I’m going to link to this discussion on my page, http://www.textbookpower.com, which is geared toward furthering the debate on this subject — and also helping students see all their options. So many good things were said in this string. There are no easy answers, but I think professors would be wise to try to work with students to at least try to combat the burden they face. Be up front at least.
Cuppa Joad - the Alibris book blog : College textbook prices cause blogger revolts on August 29, 2006 at 5:14 pm: 20
[…] Astroprof’s Page: This professor rants about issues that pump up the blood pressure of most college students: textbook prices, resulting student loan debt, and greedy publishers. Read this post and you’ll likely agree that it’s insightful, frank, and refreshing. Astroprof for president … of the universe! […]
Christy Arrington on March 29, 2007 at 4:48 pm: 21
It’s amazing to see that others (especially professors) are sensitive to this issue; as an undergraduate struggling to pay for books, I’ve always turned to websites like Amazon in an effort to find cheaper prices. The problem with Amazon, however, is that it often takes weeks to actually get the item - on multiple occasions, I received my book in the mail after we had already finished reading it in class.
Frustrated with the entire system, I created http://www.thehappyzork.com , a free website that facilitates the exchange of textbooks on a per campus basis, meaning that you can get your books almost immediately from other students. Who knows how big it will actually become, but hopefully it can help other students out.
Thanks for the great blog, Astroprof!
Astroprof’s Page » Textbook Woes on August 24, 2007 at 5:03 pm: 22
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