College textbooks are expensive. So why is it so hard to find alternatives?

$208 for one course?!?

That was my reaction to the price tag for the course materials my son needed for a junior college class this summer. I knew college textbooks were expensive even before researching and writing a report this spring on forces in the textbook market that are keeping prices high and limiting student choice, but even I was taken aback by the cost.

When I was in college, decades ago, students who didn’t want to buy a full-priced textbook could buy a used copy from the campus bookstore or another seller, share a copy with a friend, or rely on the reserve copy at the library. If students bought a new or used copy, they might sell it when they were done with the course.

Many of those options are no longer available, because publishers now focus on digital textbooks and supplementary online materials. These e-books can neither be shared nor resold, because the access codes that enable students to use these digital texts usually expire at the end of the term. Furthermore, publishers bundle hard-copy and digital textbooks with other online resources, including homework and quizzes, that can be used only once. Without these digital products, hard-copy textbooks lose much of their value for a prospective purchaser of a used book.

In trying to purchase my son’s textbook, I encountered firsthand some of the many ways that publishers and third-party campus bookstore operators make it difficult for students to find affordable textbooks and course materials.

Searching for cheaper course materials

My son, a high school student, decided to fulfill his foreign language requirement by using the dual enrollment option that his school offers with the local junior college. With the approval of his high school counselor and at no cost to him, he signed up for Spanish 1 this summer. The professor emailed the class instructions about what textbook and supplemental materials to buy from the campus bookstore.

The options at the bookstore were eye-poppingly expensive and presented in a confusing way that made comparison shopping hard.

The bookstore offered two options: buy a hard copy of the text (not a hard cover but a print-out on looseleaf paper to put into a three-ring binder) or rent a digital copy. Both options cost more than $200. Both were also bundled with multiple digital tools that students have to use if they want to pass the class.

Weirdly, the rental option was more expensive than the purchase option, which reinforced my sense that I didn’t know what was included in each bundle. The description of each package on the college bookstore’s website was full of abbreviations, such as “SSPlus(v) + wSAM (5M).” (See screenshot.)

I thought I should be able to save a little money by substituting a used copy of the textbook for the version sold by the bookstore – but this proved difficult. My son’s friend who had just completed the same class was willing to sell him the text, but when I called the bookstore to ask if I could buy only the supplemental materials they told me that the only option was to buy the whole bundle.

So, I went online, where I found I could buy a bundle that included a loose-leaf copy of the textbook and online materials directly from the publisher for $154.80 – a savings of more than $50 versus buying at the bookstore! But remember that I didn’t need the textbook – only the homework and exercises.

After more searching, I did find additional purchase options on the publisher’s website, but none that would allow me to buy the components I wanted separately.

I eventually bought the $154.80 bundle from the publisher, still a steep price for a textbook and materials that probably cover much the same content as my Spanish 1 textbook did in the late 1980s. Identifying that imperfect option took considerable time and effort, and confronted with the need to invest even more time to find what I actually wanted, I gave up.

Finding affordable textbooks and course materials shouldn’t be so hard. And it doesn’t have to be. There are a number of changes that could reduce the cost of materials for my son’s course and those of other students.

• Colleges and universities should support the development and use of open educational resources. These are free materials, typically online, developed by instructors across the country and then openly licensed for use by others. Faculty who wish to use these materials in their classes can modify them as needed, unlike with traditional textbooks, and students can access the materials for free. (A first-year Spanish class seems like an excellent candidate for an open educational resource.)
• Federal and state legislators should provide funding for development and updating of open educational resources, as New York has. This will help ensure the availability and relevance of these free resources.
• Colleges and universities should review the practices of college bookstores to ensure they are protecting students’ financial interests by limiting profit margins on course materials and supporting students in their efforts to identify and purchase cheaper options.

These changes are not enough to solve all the problems of the textbook market – which are more extensive than what I encountered in trying to buy this one book – but they’d be a start. You shouldn’t need a college degree to figure out how to buy affordable materials for college classes.