@petersuber
This suddenly reminds me of US healthcare, where you pay a lot every month and then need care and have to pay a whole lot more. Students pay so much in tuition; what if the cost of materials & fees were bundled into that, so that once you become a student (which is hard enough) you don't have to face additional costs for the learning you're there to do? @penn_state@academicchatter
@petersuber@academicchatter I agree, the costs of textbooks are too high, and textbook publishers are borderline cartels. For my classes I use open access or other legal ways to reduce these costs for students. If I have to, I choose an ebook semester access option that is never more than $40. That all said, the costs of textbooks are much less than tuition, most phone plans, cars, car insurance? Choices.
@petersuber@penn_state@academicchatter This is why I wrote my own textbook for my Spanish class. It is for free for them and they all have access before and after the course starts. It took me some time to write it, for sure, but it is great to feel that you do not collaborate with the rotten textbook system. #OER#FreeTextbook
@petersuber@penn_state@academicchatter One time I took a class while I could barely afford food, so I bought the textbook, went to my car and took pictures of every page for two hours, then returned the book. It was either that, not taking the class, or not eating
@academicchatter@petersuber@penn_state Back in the day, there were a number of textbooks for a class that I thought weren’t that great. Of course, they were available in the library. On a rather popular waiting list. I can imagine the conversations between library staff, campus bookstore vs others that wanted to see outright sales.
@petersuber@penn_state@academicchatter I went to Penn State twenty years ago, and books were expensive back then. I can only imagine now. There was a book that I refused to buy. Our professor wanted us to buy a book he wrote for his class. I managed to pass without buying it, thank goodness.
The college #textbook industry is a ripoff -- and dominated by a few publishers! Change a little bit of text, and, hey, the old edition is obsolete! Here, pay $300 for the latest one. I wish more instructors would go with "open source" and accessible PDFs of the required material. @petersuber@penn_state@academicchatter
@penn_state@petersuber@DoomsdaysCW@academicchatter having worked for one of the last independent textbook publishers before it was bought by a giant... yes. everything now is either thompson or pearson. but it seems like textbooks have always been crazy expensive and i could never figure out why. there's a LOT of marketing involved.
@rothko@DoomsdaysCW@penn_state@petersuber@academicchatter The pursuit of money… I can just imagine the board meetings when e-books became a thing:
“How will we be able to make outrageous profits if people are getting e-books instead of a physical text?”
“Let’s assign the e-books outrageous prices, too!”
@rothko@penn_state@petersuber@DoomsdaysCW@academicchatter Anything that's a semi-captive market. Anything where you can wine & dine decisionmakers and get a contract. I think this is the same reason lab supplies/reagents have such a huge markup - they're used by places with federal and state grants. "Soak the taxpayer".
@DoomsdaysCW@petersuber@penn_state@academicchatter I never tell my students to buy a specific edition, just from which year onwards if there are only minor changes. They can then search for a secondhand book.
@petersuber@penn_state@academicchatter having worked (and enjoyed working) for a textbook publisher, I tried to make all the required course materials available w/o cost in my courses...
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