Textbooks are a necessity for almost any college course. On top of providing students to read and study at home, textbooks help teachers to organize curriculums and keep their students on the same page. However, this long lasting staple of college courses is also an expensive staple.
Anyone who’s ever shopped for textbooks—either online or at a bookstore—knows that costs vary wildly. While some textbooks cost as little as $10, others can cost as much $500. The extra strain of needing the newest editions also makes renting or having a friend lend you their copy almost an impossibility.
Lizbeth Rodriguez, a psychology major, spoke about the financial burden of textbooks and how wasteful the cost really is.
“There’s no reason a book should cost up to $200. Especially when it’s not even used, yet alone used only once or twice. You can use money you’ve used on textbooks for a week’s worth of meals, maybe even more.”
For many students, finding a pirated PDF of the textbook is a far better option as one member of the editorial board remarked.
“I usually try to find a free PDF download of the textbook, but the ones I have had to purchase have been expensive.”
Although many students are used to expensive textbooks as just another cost of being a college student, the increasing popularity of digital textbooks has made things more complex and more frustrating. Unlike traditional physical textbooks, online textbooks have caused too many problems for students due to their DRM (digital rights management) components.
An example of DRM is textbooks that require a specific software or always-online connection to access such as the ones sold by Pearson. One member of the editorial board shared an incredibly frustrating experience with online DRM.
“I took an online Spanish class this summer and the work had to be done through Pearson. Access to the course material cost $116, and I wasn’t able to access any of it because the software wasn’t compatible with my four year old MacBook. I ended up dropping the class.”
On Pearson’s end, this problem could easily be fixed by providing students with PDF downloads of textbooks that can be accessed online. However, SXU should do their part in making sure not to accept these predatory business practices as they often cause major inconveniences for students.
For some courses—such as Introduction to Chemistry or Biology, texts from OpenStax.org are used. Unlike DRM options such as Pearson, OpenStax offers free open textbooks that can be downloaded and distributed freely. Transitioning from DRM textbooks to open textbooks such as the ones provided by OpenStax could alleviate much of the cost and inconvenience associated with textbooks.
According to Campus Technology magazine, more than half of all higher education institutions in the US were using open textbooks in some way. With these cost effective and convenient resources, there’s no reason SXU should continue to include Pearson or any other textbooks using anti-consumer DRM.
While many math-intensive courses use Pearson or other external software to process homework, many other free options are available. Homework can be given out via worksheets or through Canvas. Free sites like KhanAcademy also offer practice problems in a wide variety of subjects.
Expensive and inconvenient learning resources have already caused too much unnecessary stress and difficulty for both students and professors. While the transition to free textbooks and learning resources could take some more time and organization, it’s a small price to pay for the hundreds of dollars students will save on textbooks.