Every term, students flood local bookstores searching for deals on textbooks. With University fees and tuition rising, many students struggle to pay for texts, which seem to get more pricey each term.
It’s time University professors pitched in to give students’ pocketbooks a break — after all, many professors benefit financially from
assigning class texts that they authored. And it’s unreasonable to ask students to shell out money each term for books that rapidly lose
value and end up being worth a fraction of what they cost. The least professors can do is put copies of their books on reserve at the library for students who aren’t financially able to purchase their own.
The Knight Library will take purchase requests from professors and students if the book is not an academic text, such as math or science books — these books are often stolen or become outdated. The library does purchase novels and supplemental readings for University courses and encourages professors to put their personal copies of academic texts on reserve.
That leaves it up to professors to purchase texts for their class out of their own pockets. But while many professors expect students to shell out hundreds of dollars for books, they refuse to make the same purchases to help their students. Putting a $90 math book on reserve for 200 students works out to less than 50 cents per student. It’s a small price for professors to pay, and it would help everyone be able to
afford to attend the classes. And it’s assumed that professors are
in a better position financially to afford to purchase a textbook than students are.
The alternative for professors is to keep allowing copyright violations of texts, or to expect that some students will not be able to purchase or read the material at all. Some students are more likely to borrow and copy entire texts from their friends to avoid having to pay the price at the bookstore — though such copying is illegal.
Putting books on reserve in the library is easier for both students and professors. Students should have the option of reading in the
reserve room, and professors need to make these choices widely available. It is unfair to punish students who cannot afford texts by refusing to put books on reserve when the alternative is much more economical for everyone.