Think textbook prices are too high, try these alternatives
Students are having a hard enough time paying for tuition this year with their parents losing jobs and more people competing for financial aid.
Textbook prices only make things worse, adding hundreds of dollars to the cost of a higher education.
The price of textbooks has been a touchy subject for years with the General Assembly weighing in this year with legislation designed to ease the prices, which increased 186 percent from 1986 to 2004. Maketextbooksaffordable.org is a website that was designed to focus on the issue.
Luckily these days there are plenty of options for students to buy their books other than the campus bookstore. Chegg.com and campusbookrentals.com are sites where students can rent books. Half.ebay.com and Amazon.com offer books at prices much lower than the full retail price. Bookfinder.com will compare the price of a textbook on various Internet sites.
My little sister, who started community college Monday, used Bookfinder.com and paid half of what she would have at the campus bookstore.
The one problem she found was that some of the books didn't arrive when promised. So make sure you don't order a book today if you need it for class tomorrow.
What about others of you out there? What do you think about the costs of textbooks? Are they too high? Do you have other tips for saving money on books?
(Photo: Kim Hairston, The Baltimore Sun)
Categories: College/Financial aid, textbooks
Comments
One of my roommates and I were taking the same class, so we shared our books. That's an obvious one, but it works well if you know the person is reliable (and doesn't highlight if it bothers you, etc.).
Posted by: Justine | August 26, 2009 9:53 AM
The text book situation has been a huge problem for years! I believe there are incentives for college bookstores given by publishers, unfair mark up, and on and on. I have three college degrees as does my husband. Not only are the books outlandishly expensive, frequently they are purely theoretical adn not practical to your job. We both attended Notre Dame in MD where often books were required but NEVER used!!!! NEVER!!!! I assume the professor was following guidelines for establishing a syllabus. There are online journals, research papers,articles, and so on. Databases are a big help. Text books are a scam in many fields and we need to move into the 21st century. I realize that in some highly technical fields you may need the book but I have never resued a book. When you seel them to the capus bookstore you get next to nothing.
Please post this Sun article in the Inside Ed blog and see how teachres respond. We never get out of school!
Posted by: wise educator | August 26, 2009 6:29 PM
Here is another great resource http://www.edubookswap.com/
This site allows students to trade their used books with each other so they dont have to buy new books for the new semester.
Posted by: Dave Kreibom | August 27, 2009 11:33 AM