Thursday, August 30, 2007
A professor’s decision to add extra content to course textbooks led to a disagreement with a local bookstore owner about the value of additional materials.
Bill Muggy, Jayhawk Bookstore manager, is unhappy with the nonrefundable text materials required by an introductory chemistry class professor. Materials include lecture notes previously posted on Blackboard.
Peter Hierl, professor of chemistry, decided to split the textbook previously used for “Foundations of Chemistry I” and “Foundations of Chemistry II” into two separate books and to add study guides and practice exams at the back to help students.
For Bill Muggy, owner and manager of Jayhawk Bookstore, this seems like an unnecessary additional cost for students, many of whom are going to end up taking both chemistry courses and now would have to buy two books.
“It sounds like a great deal because students demand it and the bookstores love it, but that is not the case,” Muggy said. “These books have no buyback value, and the students are having to pay more for brand new books.”
Hierl said the additional content helped students perform better in the courses. However, these extra materials, including a bound notebook of the lecture notes, do have added costs.
“It isn’t going to be free, but nothing else you have to buy is either if you have to buy paper and ink to print these notes off at home,” Hierl said. “A publishing company can do the whole thing at a fraction of the cost, and students will have it at day one.”
Jared Gorman, a student in Hierl’s “Foundations of Chemistry I” course, said he thought having the notebook of course notes was helpful.
“It makes it easier to take notes, because you don’t have to write every single thing down,” Gorman, Independence senior said.
Hierl said the grades in his courses have increased considerably in the past few years, with the number of “A’s” increasing from 10.5 percent in 2004 to 25.3 percent in 2006. He said this was mainly due to more study guides, review sessions, homework assignments and availability of practice exams.
But Muggy is concerned that publishing companies are just making more money by printing these notebooks and students are having to pay more for them in return.
“Other instructors and other departments need to truly look into this and see if they need the additional packets, clickers to sign in and online tools,” Muggy said. “These professors are becoming little more than baby sitters of classes of 1,000 to 2,000 kids.”
Brad Heins, store manager of University Bookshop, said that buying revised versions did limit the availability of used textbooks. However, he said they only received complaints when students had to buy additional materials that weren’t used.
“I think instructors should be allowed to choose the material they want,” Heins said. “But if they choose new technology, it’s very important that they utilize it.”
For the past two years, Spanish courses at the University of Kansas have used an online program that goes along with students’ textbooks. For “Intermediate Spanish I” and “Intermediate Spanish II” textbooks, the online portion costs an additional $47.97. Rosalea Postma-Carttar, associate specialist for the Department of Spanish and Portuguese, thinks the additional material is beneficial.
“They get feedback more quickly and accurately, and don’t have to depend on turning papers in,” Postma-Carttar said.
Although Muggy said he didn’t deny instructors’ rights to choose their books and how they want to teach, he said that when students can only buy their books new, it was an unfair cost.
“The importance of competitiveness of the bookstores is serving the students and finding the best value for them, whether it’s through customer service, availability of used books or special ordering,” Muggy said. “Those are the values that I will always maintain.”
Hierl said that his new material was there to meet students’ demands and to help them succeed in the course.
“If it’s the difference between an ‘A’ and a ‘C,’ I think it’s worth doing,” Hierl said. “I would pay $14.95 if it meant getting an ‘A.’”
— Edited by Meghan Murphy
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