Textbook Committee

Charge: The committee was charged with investigating the issue of escalating textbook prices and determining what faculty could do to lower textbook costs for our students.

Committee Composition: Lysandra Perez-Strumolo (SSHS)

Renata Gangemi (CA)

Yvette Kisor (AIS)

Sean Gordon (student)

Recommendations:

1) We urge faculty to consider issues of price and use in ordering textbooks. The number one complaint of students is being required to purchase a textbook that is hardly used in the course. If students feel they have gotten value for their moneyãi.e. a given text was integral to the course and furthered their learningãthen they tend not to balk at a high price tag.

2) We urge faculty to make their textbook choices early and submit them promptly to the bookstore. Even those faculty who prefer to direct their students to other sources for purchasing books should be aware that students who depend on financial aid vouchers must use the bookstore to purchase books. Ordering even just a handful of copies will accommodate such students.

3) We urge faculty to consider the ability of students to sell their books back to the bookstore when the class is concluded. Only texts that are being used again, in the same or another course, can be sold back for substantial returns. If a course is taught infrequently students can hold their texts until it is taught again and the books are needed. Note that books ordered in bundles, with study guides and/or software, cannot be bought back. While the issue of buyback should not be the primary consideration in choosing texts, it can play a role.

4) We urge faculty to order only those textbooks that will be used in the course as ≥required≤ texts. For texts that will form an incidental part of the course, consider ordering them as ≥recommended.≤

5) We urge faculty to make use of the resources available at Ramapo for making material available to students.

a. Potter Library: Regular reserve and E-Reserve can be used to make texts available to students. E-Reserve in particular is useful because it can make smaller amounts of material (such as articles or essays) available to students from any computer, through the library web page. The many databases the library subscribes to often provide access to full text articles; links could be provided on syllabi.

b. TEC: Luminis or Web CT also offer ways to give students ready access to smaller amounts of material (articles, essays, book chapters, etc.). TEC is available to train and assist faculty in making use of such resources.

c. Bookstore: The bookstore will compile readers, check copyright compliance, and sell them at the bookstore; however they require 1-2 months notice.

d. Web: Many texts are not under copyright and are available on the Web. Faculty could provide links to such material on syllabi.

6) The library is available to present what resources are available at the convening group or unit level, or to any individual or group of faculty who are interested.

7) For introductory courses with multiple sections we urge faculty to consider customizing a text that could be used in sufficiently large numbers and for an extended period, thus facilitating its resale.

8) We urge faculty to consult the Campus Guide to Copyright Compliance at the Copyright Clearance Center to familiarize themselves with the issue of fair use: http://www.copyright.com/Services/copyrightoncampus/

History: The impetus for this committee came from a series of emails in September and October 2005 initiated by Roger Johnson involving Sandy Pfeiffer, Phil McLewin, and Kay Fowler concerning the rising price of textbooks. The exchange was inspired by press coverage of this issue, in particular the Government Accountability Office (GAO) study released in August 2005. The GAO study found that ≥In the last two decades, college textbook prices have increased at twice the rate of inflation but have followed close behind tuition increases. Increasing at an average of 6 percent a year, textbook prices nearly tripled from December 1986 to December 2004, while tuition and fees increased by 240 percent and overall inflation was 72 percent.≤ GAO identified ≥costs associated with developing≤ supplementary material such as CD-ROMs (bundles) as the primary factor affecting textbook pricing. Others identified frequent revision of textbooks as another factor. GAO also investigated the question of textbooks available for less outside the U.S., and identified market conditions unique to each country ≥such as the willingness and ability of students to purchase the textbook≤ as decisive factors.

Anecdotally, we identified several student behaviors that are increasing as students attempt to grapple with the problem of rising textbook prices, including scanning and printing, and/or photocopying textbooks; sharing books; ordering overseas; ordering from used bookstores through online websites, including ebay; and using older editions of textbooks. The most frequent student complaint concerned textbooks that are required but not used. A second recurrent complaint concerned books that offered little return when sold back.

After an initial organizational meeting the committee met with persons representing various perspectives on this issue. We began with the bookstore perspective, meeting with Miki Cammarata, Acting Associate Dean of Students and Contract Administrator for the Campus Store (16 November) and Teri King, Store Manager of the Ramapo Campus Store, and Sharon Baron, Regional Manager of Follett (7 December). The bookstore emphasized the importance of faculty submitting complete orders as early as possible to enable buyback for students. They stressed the importance of buyback, noting that our bookstore sells a greater proportion of used texts compared to the national average: 37.99% in 2004 and 38.1% in 2005 compared with the national average of 31%. They also noted the availability of custom books and ebooks, though noted that buyback for custom books is only possible if the text is re-used and in a hardcover (as opposed to a binder). The bookstore will also put together readers for faculty, and will take responsibility for copyright compliance, but require 1-2 months to do so.

We were also able to engage in a phone conference to gain the publishersπ perspective, and discussed these issues with Bruce Hildebrand (Executive Director, Association of American Publishers), Donald Burden (McGraw-Hill Higher Education), Rich Bigger (John Riley & Sons), and Jim Panther (Pearson Education) on 24 January 2006. They emphasized that their studies indicate that faculty members want newer material and more instructional materials (i.e., bundles). This point was reiterated several times. They identified custom books and lower cost editions as two growth areas, but noted that for custom books there are minimum requirements for enrollment that differ among publishers and according to discipline. Lower cost editions are textbooks produced as paperbacks, in smaller print, on cheaper paper, and using black & white instead of color for pictures and graphs. Along with lower cost editions ebooks were identified as offering potential savingsãas much as 50-60%ãbut the publishers noted, however, that there is student resistance to both lower cost editions and ebooks. Additional drawbacks to ebooks were restrictions in time of access in some cases (e.g. 18 months), limited ability to print out portions of the text in some cases, and the impossibility of buyback; however, the bookstore can share in revenues.

We also focused on what resources are available to faculty here at Ramapo who wish to make material available to students. We met with Elaine Risch and Irene Kuchta from Potter Library (22 February) to discuss how faculty could make use of Reserve. Faculty can place library books or personal copies on reserve in the library. They can also make use of E-Reserve, which students can then view from home through the library webpage. The library requires 1-2 weeks advance notice to process Reserve requests. The library also subscribes to numerous databases that provide access to full text articles. We met with the Technology and Education Center (TEC) to discuss resources available through Luminis and Web CT (29 February). In Luminis faculty can make use of the ≥files≤ section of their course homepage to make material available to students enrolled in their class; the same is possible through Web CT. Luminis has 24 MB of space available per course; Web CT has significantly more.