New options available for textbook buyers
By Jeffrey Christian
The Collegian
High textbook prices might be a concern of the past for Fresno State students after the Kennel Bookstore unveiled its new “E-Options” Campaign last week.
There are several different options that provide cheaper textbook alternatives. Retail Web sites such as Amazon and auction sites like eBay give students less expensive new and used books.
Natalie Freitas, a 21-year-old French major, buys the majority of her textbooks online and believes publishing companies are solely to blame for high textbook prices.
“I think that books are marked up way too much,” Freitas said. “Publishing companies want to make more money so they just add new pictures and they wrap the new books in plastic so that they are more expensive. There are a lot of subjects, particularly art history and math, where the material doesn’t change much and there isn’t a need to create new editions each semester.”
While high prices plague many students, those who prefer to purchase their textbooks on campus at the Kennel Bookstore can benefit from newly implemented programs designed to provide bandages for wounded wallets.
“A lot of students will come in and it’s a sticker shock. They’re used to getting their textbooks for free in high school and now they feel that they have to pay these outrageous prices. But if a student were to go to another school in the CSU system, then they would find the same book at a more expensive price-point,” Brent Hansen, project coordinator for Fresno State, said.
This semester the bookstore has also eased some of the burden of high prices by reducing its profit margin on certain textbooks.
“Our normal margin on textbooks is 23 percent, which is the lowest in the CSU system, but we felt that on textbooks that are priced over $100 that we would drop the margin to 20 percent,” Kennel Bookstore Book Department Manager Susan Bartel said.
However, the biggest change for the campus bookstore started last week when it launched its “E-Options” campaign. The new program offers students three different types of cheaper electronic alternatives to traditional textbooks. The new system allows students to purchase full electronic versions of printed textbooks for about half the cost.
Major textbook publishing companies such as McGraw-Hill and Thomson have created electronic versions that can be purchased at the Kennel Bookstore or through links on their online Web sites. SafariX and eBook are both complete electronic versions of their traditional counterparts.
“We’re not taking away any of the hard textbooks, we’re just giving students another outlet. This program allows students who don’t mind reading their textbooks off a computer screen or printing the pages out themselves, a chance to save money,” Hansen said.
There are a few drawbacks with the e-book technology. First, the electronic versions currently don’t offer the extra materials packaged with regular textbooks. Also, the amount of pages a student can print, the length of time the student has access to the book and the number of downloads and software recovery varies by publishing company.
Students looking to purchase smaller portions of textbooks or specific chapters can purchase single chapters through the iChapter program.
“A lot of times a professor will require a textbook and only require students to read certain chapters. In those situations, students don’t really need to buy the entire book and iChapter will be a great savings for them,” Bartel said.
Hansen graduated from Fresno State last spring and believes iChapter is the most promising of the programs because it is better tailored to meet the fundamental needs and affordability that the students are seeking.
“As a former student I am excited about it and students should take full advantage of the new options. If I was still a student I would definitely jump on the iChapter idea,” Hansen said.
Currently, the Kennel Bookstore offers about 150 different titles among the three different electronic options and that number should increase daily as the publishing companies continue to convert to electronic versions.
However, some students might be shy away from online textbooks due to their accustomed study methods and their particular majors. Sean Smith, a 21-year-old civil engineering major, has consistently spent over $300 a semester despite always trying to buy either used books or cheaper textbooks online. Despite the high cost, Smith said he would be reluctant to purchase a purely electronic textbook.
“For me as an engineer, having the textbook on a computer would be difficult. I need a tangible book in front of me,” Smith said.
While the bookstore staff and management are excited about the new medium, the challenge lies in educating themselves and students about the new technology and its availability.
Color-coded tags, an information table and signs posted on the steps of the bookstore staircases are just a few of the bookstore’s attempts to create excitement and success for the new technology.
“A lot of bookstores are concerned that publishers are going past them with the electronic textbooks,” Kennel Bookstore Director Ron Durham said. Durham said. “My feeling is that if it is the wave of the future and things are changing, then we’ll jump with it.”
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