6 ms·

One point that is often undiscussed: what defines a textbook has expanded greatly. It used to be that a textbook was just a book. But now a textbook is the book

One point that is often undiscussed: what defines a textbook has expanded greatly. It used to be that a textbook was just a book. But now a textbook is the book plus a huge collection of other resources, most of which the student never sees. A modern textbook includes tests with answer keys, a teaching guide that a grad student TA can use to teach an entire course, flash cards, supporting videos, handouts for class, online exercises, etc etc. The dirty secret of modern textbooks is that there has been a huge arms race in developing material that makes it easier to teach a course with less work. I don't really think that truly benefits students, since most of this material isn't for the student, it's for the professor (or more cynically for the free labor of grad students used to do a lot of the teaching). But you can't sell a textbook these days without it. I wish there was a universe in which you could sell a simple Psych 101 textbook for $50 and have that be that. But the market won't adopt a simple book like that without the myriad of extras. And since the market here is wonky, meaning the person making the decision (the professor) doesn't bear any of the cost (and might in fact benefit if it's her book), we end up where we are. This isn't to say that the whole new edition thing isn't worth criticism. Or that there aren't all sorts of things wrong with the industry. But the percentage increase you see in the cost of a textbook for students doesn't just equate to the same percentage increase in the profit margin of textbook publishers. They're not just making the same product from 40 years ago and jacking up the prices 1,000% as the article implies. The product is a whole different beast. (source: I sit on the board of my family's textbook publishing company)

losteverything 10y ago
Who is guiding your business, So to speak? My professors taught mostly from the textbook. I assumed (back then) they chose the texts. Chemistry. Biology. Math. Even computer science (funny that was an IBM manual and some profs college printed and stapled pages of machine instructions), physical geography (strahler & strahler), humanities, etc. But each prof referred to text to cover on our own. So now who choses what text? And doesn't that drive why you print what you print? What happens if prof doesn't like chapter 10, say?
- dougmccune 10y ago
  The professors still choose the textbook. They dictate what the student needs to buy (or rent or acquire through other means). That part of the equation hasn't changed in decades, as far as I am aware. But they're entirely disconnected from the financial burden that they place on their students. There are certainly some teachers who will care more about the financial cost than the "ease of use" (for lack of a better phrase). But often if you can offer an easier package, meaning pre-made content for use in lectures, etc. then they'll pick the more expensive book if it makes their life easier. So I could offer a simple book that retails for $50, but the prof will choose the one that costs 3x that if they don't have to make their own tests and handouts. Regarding your question about what happens if a prof doesn't like a chapter, we're starting to see decent growth in customized books. So for instance, for one class they might only want 3 chapters from one book and 4 from another. This is similar to course packs that have been around forever, but created by the publisher. Publishers love it because it means the "book" is custom for the course and you can't easily just buy/rent a used version. These are often sold much cheaper because the publisher is guaranteed 100% sell-through for a course.
  - sliverstorm 10y ago
    Of course a professor who has more time might be valuable to you- more office hours, for example, or better prepared lectures.
  - tamana 10y ago
    OK that's not bad. But in that case, how about I just buy the book (with all the aids and guides) and drop the worthless tuition payment to the school?
- jccalhoun 10y ago
  From my experience there are a handful of publishers and when it comes time to pick a book we look at the relevant book from the publishers and pick whichever we want. That being said, we don't have any control over them releasing a new version. I've had the book store tell me I had to order a new version because they couldn't get the previous one. (and of course the only difference was one or two paragraphs per chapter...) As far as the scenario of "what happens if prof doesn't like chapter 10," more and more publishers are pushing "customized texts" which we can decide what chapters we want and they will publish it on demand. My last year at my phd program they switched to a book which was combined from readings and chapters from a variety of books. The reason publishers love this is, of course, that students have to buy the book from them because the book we use at Any Town State is unique and can't be bought used from Amazon or something. So instead of being a benefit to the student it is just another scam to squeeze more money out of students.
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
Jill_the_Pill 10y ago
Seriously? some professors actually use all that crap? Over the last five years, I've been a grad student / teaching assistant at both a large state school and an ivy, and I've never once seen anyone make use of supplied handouts or tests. The professor I work for now has written a book which he never assigns, updating his handouts each year to keep current with changes. There might be more room for that $50 textbook than you think.
- dougmccune 10y ago
  I honestly hope you're right. And if so things like OpenStax might really work in higher ed. We'll definitely respond accordingly if the market tells us they want a cheaper simpler textbook.
- dougmccune 10y ago
  And also it sounds like you have worked with good professors who actually care about teaching, which is always really good to hear. Sometimes hearing about the more cynical side of how higher ed is delivered gets depressing. So keep doing what you're doing, and if you're going to become a professor yourself please become one that values teaching equally to research.
- jccalhoun 10y ago
  This semester we have switched to an OER (it is only the second week so I don't know how well it is working)but the last two years we have used a book from Cengage. The powerpoint slides and test questions that they provided were of terrible quality. I did base my powerpoint slides off of them but changed them quite a bit - including basic things like fix typos. The course was taught by several people and we came together to make a test bank and some of the questions from Cengage may have made it into that. More than that, however, Cengage (and I'm sure the other publishers as well) have been making a hard sell for their online interactive stuff and their ebooks. A year or so ago they came and made a pitch to us talking about how much cheaper they are for students (of course the students can't sell the ebooks back and can't buy used copies and their access to the book goes away after a year...) and how awesome the interactive online stuff was. Luckily, the course director is kind of a self-professed Luddite and didn't really care for it but other people at the meeting bought the sales pitch completely so if we had a different course director I could see being forced to use this drmed junk.
emerod 10y ago
Nothing has changed in the last 20 years in terms of the economic model for the textbook publishing industry. The strategy is still about how to create artificial demand with useless features and how to create artificial scarcity with exclusive deals. Yes, 20 years ago they really were literally taking the same product (like, the same text and photos) from 20 years before and jacking up the price 1000% by putting fake "revised edition" labels on them. Now that production costs have dropped, distribution costs have dropped, and sources of information have exploded, they are looking for new ways to jazz up old content to appeal to students and professors. But it is the same hopelessly corrupt and wasteful industry.
lawnchair_larry 10y ago
This is such a load of crap. The textbook industry maliciously engineered this market in whatever way they could to kill used book sales. You're out to screw students whether you like to admit it or not. Planned obsolescence is a core element of your business strategy.

losteverything 10y ago

Who is guiding your business, So to speak? My professors taught mostly from the textbook. I assumed (back then) they chose the texts. Chemistry. Biology. Math. Even computer science (funny that was an IBM manual and some profs college printed and stapled pages of machine instructions), physical geography (strahler & strahler), humanities, etc. But each prof referred to text to cover on our own. So now who choses what text? And doesn't that drive why you print what you print? What happens if prof doesn't like chapter 10, say?

dougmccune 10y ago
The professors still choose the textbook. They dictate what the student needs to buy (or rent or acquire through other means). That part of the equation hasn't changed in decades, as far as I am aware. But they're entirely disconnected from the financial burden that they place on their students. There are certainly some teachers who will care more about the financial cost than the "ease of use" (for lack of a better phrase). But often if you can offer an easier package, meaning pre-made content for use in lectures, etc. then they'll pick the more expensive book if it makes their life easier. So I could offer a simple book that retails for $50, but the prof will choose the one that costs 3x that if they don't have to make their own tests and handouts. Regarding your question about what happens if a prof doesn't like a chapter, we're starting to see decent growth in customized books. So for instance, for one class they might only want 3 chapters from one book and 4 from another. This is similar to course packs that have been around forever, but created by the publisher. Publishers love it because it means the "book" is custom for the course and you can't easily just buy/rent a used version. These are often sold much cheaper because the publisher is guaranteed 100% sell-through for a course.
- sliverstorm 10y ago
  Of course a professor who has more time might be valuable to you- more office hours, for example, or better prepared lectures.
- tamana 10y ago
  OK that's not bad. But in that case, how about I just buy the book (with all the aids and guides) and drop the worthless tuition payment to the school?
jccalhoun 10y ago
From my experience there are a handful of publishers and when it comes time to pick a book we look at the relevant book from the publishers and pick whichever we want. That being said, we don't have any control over them releasing a new version. I've had the book store tell me I had to order a new version because they couldn't get the previous one. (and of course the only difference was one or two paragraphs per chapter...) As far as the scenario of "what happens if prof doesn't like chapter 10," more and more publishers are pushing "customized texts" which we can decide what chapters we want and they will publish it on demand. My last year at my phd program they switched to a book which was combined from readings and chapters from a variety of books. The reason publishers love this is, of course, that students have to buy the book from them because the book we use at Any Town State is unique and can't be bought used from Amazon or something. So instead of being a benefit to the student it is just another scam to squeeze more money out of students.

deleted 10y ago

[deleted]

Jill_the_Pill 10y ago

Seriously? some professors actually use all that crap? Over the last five years, I've been a grad student / teaching assistant at both a large state school and an ivy, and I've never once seen anyone make use of supplied handouts or tests. The professor I work for now has written a book which he never assigns, updating his handouts each year to keep current with changes. There might be more room for that $50 textbook than you think.

dougmccune 10y ago
I honestly hope you're right. And if so things like OpenStax might really work in higher ed. We'll definitely respond accordingly if the market tells us they want a cheaper simpler textbook.
dougmccune 10y ago
And also it sounds like you have worked with good professors who actually care about teaching, which is always really good to hear. Sometimes hearing about the more cynical side of how higher ed is delivered gets depressing. So keep doing what you're doing, and if you're going to become a professor yourself please become one that values teaching equally to research.
jccalhoun 10y ago
This semester we have switched to an OER (it is only the second week so I don't know how well it is working)but the last two years we have used a book from Cengage. The powerpoint slides and test questions that they provided were of terrible quality. I did base my powerpoint slides off of them but changed them quite a bit - including basic things like fix typos. The course was taught by several people and we came together to make a test bank and some of the questions from Cengage may have made it into that. More than that, however, Cengage (and I'm sure the other publishers as well) have been making a hard sell for their online interactive stuff and their ebooks. A year or so ago they came and made a pitch to us talking about how much cheaper they are for students (of course the students can't sell the ebooks back and can't buy used copies and their access to the book goes away after a year...) and how awesome the interactive online stuff was. Luckily, the course director is kind of a self-professed Luddite and didn't really care for it but other people at the meeting bought the sales pitch completely so if we had a different course director I could see being forced to use this drmed junk.

emerod 10y ago

Nothing has changed in the last 20 years in terms of the economic model for the textbook publishing industry. The strategy is still about how to create artificial demand with useless features and how to create artificial scarcity with exclusive deals. Yes, 20 years ago they really were literally taking the same product (like, the same text and photos) from 20 years before and jacking up the price 1000% by putting fake "revised edition" labels on them. Now that production costs have dropped, distribution costs have dropped, and sources of information have exploded, they are looking for new ways to jazz up old content to appeal to students and professors. But it is the same hopelessly corrupt and wasteful industry.

lawnchair_larry 10y ago

This is such a load of crap. The textbook industry maliciously engineered this market in whatever way they could to kill used book sales. You're out to screw students whether you like to admit it or not. Planned obsolescence is a core element of your business strategy.