mollytiffanybennyamanda


 * The //Real// Cost of College Textbooks**

We chose our topic to be about the cost of college textbooks. Students all over the world can relate to this topic. Textbook costs are increasingly outrageous and a discretely emptying students' and their parents' pockets. What makes the cost even more impacting is the fact that new textbooks must be purchased each semester; not only do students pay the large fee once, but twice. Where is the money for college textbooks going? The last link on the page is to an article by John Tozzi that states, "Entering freshman in 2010 will pay 32 percent more than the graduating class of 2010 did four years ago." Even when students order their textbooks to be the online versions, it is almost as expensive as purchasing the actual textbooks. In making the virtual version of the textbooks, there is no publisher fee, so where is the money for college textbooks going, and why in such large quantities? We would like to debate the issues inherently presented in e-books: the fact that there should be less of a cost to produce, perhaps allowing the authors to cut out the publishers altogether, and also the ability to use Digital Rights Management to limit the time the text is valid, for example, only purchasing the rights to the text for the length of the semester. Our plan is to research and discover where the money for these textbooks is actually going. We want to focus on the opinions of others, seeing where they believe the money is going, and to discover their ideas on solutions for this problem. We will evaluate all of these sources to come up with our own evaluation of how to solve this dilemma.

~Koch, James, Byron W. Brown, Anya Kamenetz, Bruce Hildebrand, Robert Applebaum, Eric Weil, and Charlotte Allen. "[|The Real Cost of College Textbooks]." //The New York Times//. The New York Times, 25 July 2010. Web. 20 Oct. 2010. This is actually 7 different articles that discuss why they think the cost of college textbooks is so high and what can be done to reduce these costs.

~Lipka, Sara. "[|Experts Discuss Textbook Costs]." //Academic Search Premier//. EBSCO, 15 June 2007. Web. 20 Oct. 2010. This is an article that discusses the governmental aspect of the price of textbooks.

~Allen, Charlotte. "[|Why Do Textbooks Cost So Much?]" //Minding the Campus//. Manhattan Institute, 4 Apr. 2008. Web. 25 Oct. 2010. This article addresses the fact that textbooks are so expensive and discusses the reasons for why this is so.

~Kinzie, Susan. "[|Swelling Textbook Costs Have College Students Saying "Pass"]" //Washington Post//. The Washington Post Company, 23 Jan. 2006. Web. 20 Oct. 2010. This article discusses the change in textbook prices over the years, and that lots of students are taking the risk of not buying books because of the hefty cost.

~Grove, Allen. "[|Why Do College Books Cost So Much?]" //About.com:College Admissions//. The New York Times, Web. 20 Oct. 2010. This article trys to explain why the books cost so much and gives a description of each of the reasons.

Orchowski, Peggy. "Congress Questions Sky-High Costs of College Textbooks." //Black Issues in Higher Education// 21.14 (2004): 6-7. //Academic Search Premier//. EBSCO. Web. 27 Oct. 2010.

Tozzi, John. "Online Startups Target College Book Costs." //Bloomberg Businessweek// 4197 (2010): 53-54. //Academic Search Premier//. EBSCO. Web. 25 Oct. 2010. This article discusses start-up companies that are offering less expensive, equally valued books in various formats as a reaction to increasing textbook costs from major publishers.

~Robbins, Lisa L. "Rising Cost of College Textbooks:[|High Book Prices Hurt Students and Authors, but Benefit Sellers]." //Suite 101//. Lisa L. Robbins, 21 Sept. 2008. Web. 25 Oct. 2010.