Learning Objectives
By the end of this section, you will be able to:
- Define Textbook Affordability
- Identify specific action items to lower textbook costs
What is Textbook Affordability?
The 2019 Bureau of Labor Statistics says that textbook costs have increased 1,000% since the 1970s, and they have risen 88% between 2006 and 2016. Bundled access codes sometimes hide costs from students, they can be used for only a certain amount of time, and they can render the digital book useless without the code. Finding solutions to the high cost of textbooks and their impact on students’ lives and their success is the idea of Textbook Affordability.
It is important to stop and admit that “books and supplies” are not the highest cost leading to affordability issues in higher education. So, why are we talking about this one? “It is the one cost that we as faculty can impact and it has a disproportionate impact on the academic success of students” (Ernst, 2020).
The American textbook market contributes to the problem in a variety of ways. The demand is not directly linked to the price because the actual consumers, students, do not choose which textbooks they purchase; faculty make the decisions, and they tend to pay significantly less attention to changes in pricing. Eighty percent of the market is controlled by only five large publishers, and the recently announced McGraw-Hill/Cengage merger would reduce this to four, potentially further inflating prices (Berman, 2019). Many universities own their bookstore or contract with outside vendors to operate bookstores, which allows them to profit from textbook sales and disincentivizes them from controlling textbook costs. Publishers have adopted a number of tactics to maximize profits and reduce the resale value of textbooks, including bundled textbook packages with online materials whose access codes expire at the end of the semester, custom or loose-leaf editions, and the release of new editions every few years with minimal changes but significantly increased pricing (Koch, 2006).[1]
Key Takeaways
- Textbook affordability measures directly impact student evaluations, faculty academic freedom, ease of publishing, and culturally responsive teaching.
- Textbook affordability gives faculty freedom to tailor the content you want, offer you the option to add/mix with your material, and increase culturally responsive teaching practices by adding information to the materials.
- Textbook affordability directly impacts underserved students by improving student outcomes, leading to student persistence and dropout rates. Also, it can reach socially excluded students, increase participation, bridge the gap between formal and informal education (Jenkins et al., 2020).
- Textbook affordability impacts students who have resources by accessing the material on the first day, funds for other things, and lower student debt.
Textbook Affordability
Do you know how much the textbook you have selected for your courses will cost students? Is the textbook bundled and sold with a CD or supplementary materials? Are those materials necessary for the course? How often are new editions of a textbook released by the publisher? Are there significant differences between editions? These questions cut to the heart of the textbook affordability issue.
Textbook prices have risen by 812% over the past 35+ years, and since 2006, textbook costs have increased at a rate four times faster than the rate of inflation (Zook, 2017). The California Public Interest Research Group found that 22 frequently assigned textbooks had an average cost of $131.44 (Capriccioso, 2006). The average cost of textbooks per student per year has risen to over $1100, and 30% of college students use financial aid to buy their textbooks (Zook, 2017), contributing to the student loan debt burden students face. Considering these numbers, the outcry over the escalating cost of textbooks is understandable. To address this issue, state policy makers and universities are exploring ways to ensure students can access affordable textbooks.
In 2006, the Illinois Board of Higher Education (IBHE) requested university faculty, student groups, and bookstore managers to examine college textbook prices and the feasibility of a textbook rental program and other cost-saving measures for textbooks. The ensuing report states that “Textbook rental programs and alternative cost-saving measures can help reduce the financial burden on students and families from escalating textbook costs. For such efforts to be successful, however, they will need the support of institutional administrators, students, faculty, bookstore operators, and publishers. State assistance in procuring funds for start-up costs would be vital to the success of textbook rental programs” (Illinois Board of Higher Education, 2007). Aside from textbook rental programs, there are ways for individual faculty to make textbooks affordable for their students. Consider the following cost-saving alternatives from the IBHE report and the Chicago Tribune (Bigda, 2007), as well as other common-sense recommendations:
- Discourage faculty and academic departments from pecuniary benefits from textbook selection.
- Investigate the cost of a textbook before adopting it for a course. If the cost is prohibitive, explore other alternatives such as an electronic version of the book or a previous (but still relevant) edition, which may be less expensive.
- Make textbook adoptions early so that students can explore lower-cost alternatives for purchasing the book (e.g. comparison shopping, interlibrary loan, book swap, online marketplace orders, etc.).
- Increase students’ awareness of textbook purchase or acquisition options, such as used textbooks, electronic texts, discount book sellers, cheaper versions of the same books sold abroad, and reserve copies in the library. Facilitate book exchanges and swaps among students. This could be a service activity for student organizations. See bookswap.com, a student-to-student bulletin board, where students can sell and buy textbooks 24/7.
- Check textbooks on the same course topics available for other disciplines. Sometimes books on the same topic may be sold at different prices for different disciplines.
- Avoid requiring more than one textbook for a course. Instead, provide class notes or supplemental materials for content covered in additional textbooks.
- Analyze the content and price of different textbooks available for the same course. Consider using a less expensive textbook that contains most of the necessary content and provide class materials for the missing information.
- Use the same textbook for several semesters even if the publisher releases newer editions, or allow students to purchase recent, previous editions. Newer editions may only have minor changes or corrections, and faculty can notify students about relevant revisions to the text.
- Use textbooks with substantial content that can be used for more than one course. In some cases, it may be possible to use one part of a book for an introductory course and the other part for an advanced course. There may need to be collaboration among faculty for this initiative to be effective.
- Discourage publishers from bundling textbooks with CDs or supplementary materials that are not essential for the course. Require that textbooks and supplementary materials be sold separately instead of bundled together at a higher cost.
- Negotiate with publishers for lower prices based on volume purchase or textbook adoptions for several courses. Support publishers who provide low-cost textbooks. Check with bookstores that might have suggestions about negotiating lower textbook prices.
- Develop your own course materials and post them online or have them sold as a bookstore course pack.
- Use Open Education Resources (OER), which are low-cost or free curated resources. There are multiple places to find OER online, including OpenStax, OER Commons, and MERLOT.
NIU’s University Libraries have developed a guide on textbook affordability for faculty (there is also a section for students, which you may want to share with your classes).
Summary
According to a 2017 Wakefield study, 85% of students delay or avoid purchasing course materials, 91% of those students cited cost as the reason they delayed or avoided buying course materials, and 50% of students said that delaying or avoiding purchasing materials had negatively impacted their grades (as cited in “Textbook Affordability: Resources and Alternatives,” 2019). There may not be one perfect solution for taming the cost of textbooks for all courses, but we can join the ranks of other universities and faculty who are implementing the alternatives outlined here. By making conscious decisions about how we choose our textbooks and selecting textbooks that are accessible to our students, we can promote student success and engagement at NIU.[2]
References
Bigda, C. (2007). Learn to cut cost of books for college: Illinois mulls programs for renting, not buying. Chicago Tribune.
Capriccioso, R. (2006). A Closer read on textbook costs. Inside Higher Ed. Retrieved from https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2006/08/17/closer-read-textbook-costs
Illinois Board of Higher Education. (2007). A report on the feasibility of textbook rental programs and other textbook cost-saving alternatives in Illinois Public Higher Education. Retrieved from https://legacy.ibhe.org/Board/agendas/2007/February/Item12TextbookReport.pdf
Powers, E. (2006). Wanted: Book for a term. Inside Higher Ed. Retrieved from https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2006/03/23/wanted-book-term
Textbook Affordability: Resources and Alternatives. (2019). Retrieved from https://libguides.niu.edu/c.php?g=753476&p=5397370
Zook, C. (2017). Infographic: Textbook costs skyrocket 812% in 35 years. Retrieved from https://www.aeseducation.com/blog/infographic-the-skyrocketing-cost-of-textbooks-for-schools-students
Attribution: Northern Illinois University Center for Innovative Teaching and Learning. (2020). Textbook affordability. In Instructional guide for university faculty and teaching assistants. Retrieved from https://www.niu.edu/citl/resources/guides/instructional-guide. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
- Murphy, J. A., & Shelley, A. (2020). Textbook Affordability in the Time of COVID-19. Serials Review, 46(3), 232-237. ↵
- Northern Illinois University Center for Innovative Teaching and Learning. (2020). Textbook affordability. In Instructional guide for university faculty and teaching assistants. Retrieved from https://www.niu.edu/citl/resources/guides/instructional-guide ↵