Letter
to the editor: A Bookstore rebuttal
I
was interested in your article about cheaper
textbooks and the problem students are having
with book prices. The first thing I noticed
is that there is no mention of whether or
not any representatives from the bookstore
were present at this meeting. It's all well
and good to have professors from various
departments voice their opinions about the
problem, but do they in fact fully understand
how a bookstore works? I work at a community
college bookstore and we have the same problem
on our campus.
Yes,
I agree the publishers are making outrageous
profits off of these books. I also believe
the buyback system is not very good, but
let's look at how a bookstore operates.
It
is true that because of the small size and
independent nature of any college store
they are not going to get the same kind
of discount a major chain would have. But
the mass adoption of a single book for a
whole department would only work in very
few subjects. There is no way a single book
could be adopted for the majority of the
classes in the history department or in
many of the literature classes. Each class
deals with a separate time period and/or
subject. It would however work in a computer,
math or basic science class. Something that
has been discussed at industry conferences
is the idea of a single book being adopted
and a guarantee from a department that they
would stick with that book for the life
of the edition. This could open the possibility
of book rentals up. Book rentals have been
tried in some schools nationwide and are
feasible only in certain circumstances.
What works on one campus does not always
work on another campus.
The
problem of book prices is a very complex
one. There is no simple, magic answer. I
work in a bookstore but I am also a student
paying those prices alongside fellow students.
I am also a parent paying those prices for
my daughter. Bookstore personnel are not
always happy with the way the system works
either. If there is a way we could help
students we are willing to look at it. One
of the few suggestions I would make is that
the sooner we have a book adoption for a
class turned in, the sooner we can try to
find used copies of that book with used
book companies. The later an adoption is
turned in, the harder it is to find. We
are competing with colleges across the country
for stock. Another personal suggestion is
that maybe the policy of free desk copies
for instructors should be eliminated so
instructors could see how much the students
have to pay. If they had to pay the same
prices, they might put more thought into
which book they adopt. Thank you for giving
me an opportunity to clear the air on some
issues that have bothered me for some time.
-- Teresa McGraw
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