Gah! I hate buying textbooks!

[TexasVet]

I'm a contract writer for McGraw-Hill's college textbook division, so let me provide some insight...
- Today's students today expect full-color books, which is horribly expensive to print. Black-and-white books would be a fraction of the cost
- Publishers pay people like me to generate the test banks, PowerPoint presentations, and Instructor's Manuals that professors get for free
- They also pay formatters, editors, proofreaders, graphic artists, and so on
- Every picture used in the book must be bought, and most require royalties
- The author(s) only earn a couple of dollars per book sold, and they only earn that when NEW textbooks are purchased.
- Used books don't generate money for anybody but the book seller. So the bookstore is clearing more per book that the publisher or the author.
- As a rule, the books are updated every two years.

Hope that helps explain a few things!

Kathy, Bellville TX
www.ChickenTrackin.com

 

[I have WHAT in my yard?]

This is why it infuriates me when I see sample copies that were sent to professors for sale!

Truly the authors don't get much and as colleagues they should understand that.

But, having said that I try to make sure there is a copy of the text on reserve for students who cannot buy it, I choose texts when I have a choice, that are as cheap as I can manage with and I use the same text for as many semesters as I can until it gets out of date. Some subject matters are out of date really really fast. Some don't change much. Look around and I do recommend contacting the professor for recommendations.

One school sells a mandatory text with a reader and study guide that most students don't use but you cannot buy them separately. In some cases, esp when Barnes and Noble takes over a college bookstore they'll wait until the very last second and then tell the prof they can't get that text. When what they really mean is that the text is not available through B&N. Bookstores should all be run by the college as a non-profit enterprise, but not many do anymore.

And some schools now have deals with the sellers that takes the choice of texts out of the professor's hands. KHayward is right, but I suspect texts will be on-line or al kindle based soon.

 

[TexasVet]

The person who got me into writing for McGraw was Jack Ivancevich (see his profile at http://www.bauer.uh.edu/news/deans_journal/vol2/interview_ivancevitch.htm). He was a dean at the University of Houston, plus the author of 78 college textbooks. He was also ahead of his time, getting with others to create www.FreeloadPress.com.

His idea was to make college more affordable by lowering the cost of textbooks. So any books offered through their site are FREE. They can do that by placing ads within the pages of the text. I haven't seen one yet, but the original idea was to customize coupons/ads to the student's local area and then place them on the last page of every chapter. So you might find a "free cup of coffee" coupon for the Starbucks in your town. Students also have the option of buying an ad-free version.

They sell direct to students, pay the authors larger royalties than big publishers, and also allow new authors to break into the field. (The more books you sell, the cheaper each book is to print, so your profit margin increases. Therefore, you don't want a new author in the same topic diluting sales.) Over 300 colleges & universities now use Freeload Press, so the idea is definitely catching on.

Students can download textbooks for free, or they can get a printed paperback version for $20 to $40.

Check it out!

Kathy, Bellville TX
www.ChickenTrackin.com

 

[Bantimna]

We recived from a freind 100 school books, so for the past 3 grades no need to buy any books. But we were in our local bookstore and it cost's about R 5-10 a book.