As a way to help students save money on textbooks, an ASU group held a day of action at the Tempe and West campuses Wednesday, speaking to professors and students about alternatives to expensive textbooks.
With the cost of textbooks accounting for 7 or 8 percent of a full-time student’s annual tuition, according to the U.S. Government Accountability Office, the Arizona Students’ Association has been asking professors this week to pledge to provide cheaper textbook alternatives for students, such as rented or online textbooks.
So far, ASA has collected about 40 total signatures affirming that professors will select the textbook most appropriate for class and make cheaper textbook options their preference. As of Wednesday night, about 20 statements of intent were from the Tempe campus, 12 from the Downtown campus and eight from the Polytechnic campus, said Mike Slugocki, ASU field organizer for ASA. The number of signatures from the West campus is unknown, he said.
“I can’t think of a single student who would say, ‘I’m OK with spending $900 a year on textbooks when there are more affordable options out there,’” said Jessica DeWitt, the diversity representative for ASA at the West campus.
Students from the Downtown campus also held a day of action on Tuesday informing students about affordable textbook options, and the Polytechnic campus has been collecting letters of intent from professors all week.
The student group is targeting professors because they understand the difficulty students have with purchasing expensive textbooks, said DeWitt, a history senior.
“We feel like [professors] are on our side with this, and they share our concerns about textbook affordability,” she said. “That’s why we want them to work with us to find a solution to expensive textbooks.”
ASA students are also warning professors against “bundled textbooks” that come with supplemental items, such as CDs and booklets, that are often not used in class but add to the textbook price, DeWitt said.
The best alternatives to expensive textbooks are open-source textbooks, allowing students to access textbooks online for free, she said. Online textbook purchases also allow students to download books to electronic devices or print them for $20.
Ben Henderson, an English literature senior and ASA director for University Student Government, said the group wants to give students options to save money.
“We are trying to make students aware of alternatives to buy cheaper textbooks before spending hundreds of dollars on textbooks,” Henderson said.
Not purchasing textbooks is unavoidable because they are an important part of student success in college, he said, but affordability could be improved.
“In the six years that I’ve been at ASU, I’ve seen the cost of textbooks go up, and in this tough economy, one of the important things we can do is try to save as much money on textbooks,” Henderson said.
The one to blame for expensive textbooks is the “broken textbook market,” said Joel Edman, ASA Tempe campus director.
The textbook market doesn’t work like other markets because textbook companies often present materials to professors without full disclosure of the final retail price, he said.
“Students don’t get to decide what textbooks to purchase, it is the professors who choose and even then, [professors] sometimes don’t know the prices of textbooks before they buy them,” Edman said.
In an effort to give students the power to act as consumers and choose which textbooks to buy, ASA is working on creating a textbook exchange program in the fall where students could trade and purchase textbooks from each other for “bearable prices,” he said.
But accountancy professor Jenny Brown, who signed the statement of intent in support of cheaper textbook alternatives, said ASA should target textbook companies instead of professors.
Upper-level division courses, like the ones Brown teaches, have a limited number of textbooks available to purchase, giving professors few options to choose from.
“Given how small [textbook companies’] target audience is and how few textbooks they sell, they are not going to be on the front wave of open-source textbooks or rentals,” she said about the textbook publishers she uses, adding that they will likely be among the last to switch to alterative textbooks.
“If people are interested in changing the environment, they are better off going to the publisher and convincing the publisher to lower the textbook prices,” Brown said.
Reach the reporter at griselda.nevarez@asu.edu.
