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Articles: Expert Advice
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Are colleges in cahoots with textbook publishers?
rymd
- Posts: 1,055 Senior Member
Whyyy do classes make you buy always the newest editions of textbooks even the year they come out, and with your own money? 
(( already paying tens of thousands come on
the changes between editions are minimal, and most of the changes are in page numbers and problem sets
most of my professors say that they didn't choose the textbook and so department/administration would be responsible for textbook choice.
why
should we have to pay $60 extra for a different set of problems and tiny changes?
there's no other explanation... colleges are in business with the publishers
(( already paying tens of thousands come onthe changes between editions are minimal, and most of the changes are in page numbers and problem sets
most of my professors say that they didn't choose the textbook and so department/administration would be responsible for textbook choice.
why
should we have to pay $60 extra for a different set of problems and tiny changes?
there's no other explanation... colleges are in business with the publishers
Post edited by rymd on
This discussion has been closed.
Replies to: Are colleges in cahoots with textbook publishers?
Publishing houses like to have a new edition every 3-4 years because it keeps their revenue stream up. The prof who wrote the book can refuse to produce a newer edition, but in many cases the publisher can then take it over and publish a new edition of the book using revisions done by someone else. That's a pretty powerful incentive to profs to keep coming out with new editions; they don't want to lose control of their work.
I think it's safe to say your profs aren't in cahoots with the publishers. I doubt the administration is either. There might be a cozy relationship between the college bookstore and the publishers, but I don't have any evidence that there is.
I'm just sick of going into the bookstore at the end of the semester and hearing "we're not buying that book back because a new edition is coming out".
Without new editions the bookstore can't make that claim.
But I was curious about the issue, so I did a little google digging. Apparently, some profs and university admins might be more culpable than I thought. For example, universities sometimes get a part of the profits from the bookstore in a sort of kickback arrangement. And some universities require students to buy custom editions of a book which are significantly more expensive, but which not significantly different. (In one example, the custom book included a few pages about the college that were available for free from the college's website). That still doesn't put the university in cahoots with the publisher, but they do seem to have a common interest insofar as the publisher, bookstore and university all benefit from higher prices.
I never personally knew a prof or college who engaged in these tactics, however.