<p>Told Lake Jr. to try to sell his Chemistry textbook from last year now that the first week of class has begun. Book cost over $200 new last year. Ouch! Lake Jr. handles his books gently, never marks in them, leaving them like new. Well, he's out of luck because the school has mandated use of the new edition just published earlier this year (at a higher cost than last year's edition). I checked Amazon and discovered that for the extra money, the publisher has eliminated about 20 pages. What an innovation!!! Copies of the prior edition are now essentially being given away and certainly not selling for 200 bucks!!! And...the professor requires the online supplement, i.e an access code. By the way, the vintage of the "old edition" is 2011.</p>
<p>There was just an article of Yahoo! last week about the cost of textbooks. A professor (who happens to teach at my daughter’s school) said he never cared how much the textbooks he assigned cost - until his own child went to college! He said now he and the other profs in his department get together and select the books, and this one book can be used for 3 years of courses (some kind of biology). Now subsequent years may also require another book or more materials, but the core book is good for years.</p>
<p>I had sticker shock for my daughter’s books for her first year of engineering when it rang up at over $1100, but it turned out that two professors had required both the hardcover book and the access code when only one is needed (dropping the bill a little) and that most of the books are good for the full year, so second semester should be close to nothing.</p>
<p>So some teachers ARE hearing our shouts of pain and are trying to keep costs down. Publishers are worried as there are more free places to get material. I have hope. I also have a $300 chemistry book!</p>
<p>I spent about $1,000 this semester for DS who is college freshman majoring in biology. Ouch!
Since this is my first child, I was not sure if buying used books is a good idea. I also was not sure if any books come with CD’s which is not always in used books.
I am hoping some books will be used next semester. </p>
<p>My biggest concern and source of irritation is when you purchase a textbook and (or) access code and either is hardly used.</p>
<p>I accompanied my daughter to the bookstore yesterday as she was getting her textbooks for this semester. She likes writing throughout her books, so I always encourage her to get new textbooks. One of the books she picked up ($110) was used because there were no ‘new’ texts available. What I noticed immediately about MOST of these ‘used’ books was how NEW they seemed to be. They looked like they were rarely opened.</p>
<p>I can only hope that the instructor uses the $110 textbook he assigned.</p>
<p>Twoinanddone, we should start the ‘Gold-plated Chemistry Textbooks Parents Support Group,’ fashioned after that bank commercial on TV where the incredulous dad uses a smartphone app to send his daughter the cash she needs for a new Chemistry textbook. “What is it, made of gold?” The truly hilarious part is when he says no to her request for additional cash for spring break in Cancun. “No, you’ll be on break enjoying your new textbook.”</p>
<p>I spent about $1,000 this semester for DS who is college freshman majoring in biology</p>
<p>That seems really high.
My daughter was a bio major and I don’t expect we paid much over that cumulatively, till she graduated.
Of course her college is in a city with a fabulous new/used bookstore chain. ( shipping is free for orders above $50)
<a href=“http://www.powells.com”>http://www.powells.com</a>
Her schools bookstore also seemed to have pretty good prices on books we couldn’t find elsewhere.
As long as the ISBN # matches & they are in decent shape, used or remaindered books ahould be fine. </p>
<p>EK…that is not a high price if bought at the college bookstore…even used.</p>
<p>Folks…stay away from your university bookstores. They are a total ripoff. The prices are high, and what they give the student on buy back is pathetic. </p>
<p>My kid had a running account with Amazon. She bought and sold from them after her first term. She got some books from half.com as well…always having the ISBN for the term when she ordered.</p>
<p>We did find a couple books that were new through Amazon. $40 for a $300 book with dvd.
Just start early and allow for time to ship.
Bookstores generally listbooks needed for each course online, so you can order over holiday breaks.</p>
<p>Your school probably does not own the bookstore. It’s probably contracted out the same way the cafeteria probably is, to a company like Follet’s. Recently the bookstores have become aware that professors themselves are advising students to buy books from alternate sources. I’ve done this myself. The bookstore chains don’t like it. They say employees of the school should NOT say things that undermine the contract, and that doing so constitutes a breech. (And legally, this might even be true.)</p>
<p>I expect them to complain more and more, and for administrators to police it more and more.</p>
<p>My point is this: even if your professor doesn’t mention an alternative source, that doesn’t mean your professor doesn’t want you to find one. You’ll probably get more candid information from the professor if you speak one-on-one.</p>
<p>My way to save money on text books is to buy them used online early in Summer. The cheaper ones would be gone faster. Sell them back after the course. The net cost would be the difference between the 2 transactions and sometimes one can even make money on it. It is usually cheaper this way than renting a book. However, there are a few cases it does not apply this way. First, when online access code or CD is required which sometimes costs around half of the book. Second, course pack from school would be difficult to find online and one may need to get it from the University bookstore. Third, work book or lab manual may be not reusable. One should not buy these used and they have little resell value. Last, there may be a new edition of the book that you cannot find a used one and it is harder to sell the old version.
There are other ways to save money such as buying international or previous edition of textbooks. For the main content of the book may be fine most of the time, but the problems and homework may be different.
The last suggestion is to consult the students who took the class already (or ask the tutor) to see if the book is really necessary.
Finally, I have heard horrible story from renting books that sometimes students were charged for previous damage at return which increased the cost unexpectedly.</p>
<p>What Thumper said. Also, sometimes rentals are available, and there are several rental companies. Students sometimes bookshare, and one friend of mine’s D one semester used the school library for every book she needed. One college we looked at last summer allows students to borrow the books from the school for free on a first-come first-serve basis. They know that not everyone can afford $1,000 a semester for books alone.</p>
<p>D16 is taking classes at Ohio University non-matriculated–we rent them from amazon. Free 2 day shipping with Prime, free return shipping, and her 167 dollar US history book was 60. And students, I believe qualify for free prime. </p>
<p>I don’t think student Prime accts are free, but they are discounted.
D also rented from Chegg, but as she got further along in her studies, I pointed out that she may want to hang onto some of her books as a resource.</p>
<p>I would use etextbooks, however, sometimes you need more than one book open at a time, so I would be more likely to buy the main book as digital, then the other books as hard copies.</p>
<p>I believe the ipad & Android tablets are easier to use than Kindle for taking notes.</p>
<p>Amazon Prime has a free trial for college students for six months. It used to be free for college students for their time in college, but that changed a while back.</p>
<p>I posted the same link in a similar textbook access code thread I started last night. Bill summarized the situation correctly above. I am new to buying textbooks and never even knew that access codes existed. The requirement to use them completely undermines the used textbook market. But at least I now know why people budget so much for college textbooks!</p>
<p>Just buy as much as possible on Amazon / whatever and if you need a brand new edition, then you are out of luck, sorry!!. As far as science books, yest they are a bit more expensive, but wait unitl Grad. School, then maybe you will not feel this way any more. They are very pretty books and they do not have to be this way, they could have been prited cheaply, but everybody and thier bro. wants to make money…and nothing we can do except to buy used as much as possible (and they are usually not very cheap either). Well, renting may not be a solution for somebody who (just as one example) wants to hold on to the book for couple years as it may be needed for the next (Grad. school) exam preparation. </p>
<p>Like Billcsho said, there are options. I’ve talked about International Editions on CC before. Just purchased an advanced chemistry book for Lake Jr., the I.E. of a book widely used at American universities. It’s a hardbound copy and cost about half of the U.S. version. Once again, Lake Jr. reports that the book is identical to the U.S. version, including the cover. The university bookstore charges a few bucks more for a loose-leaf binder edition, which are notoriously easily damaged. But I can’t criticize the bookstore. At Lake Jr.'s school the bookstore is university owned and operated and they try to create the best deals for students. At times their prices are on par with Amazon. They keep overhead costs low and no one gets rich working there. But I would still go broke if Lake Jr. purchased every STEM textbook at the university bookstore, which is why we seek other options; I.E. and used editions on Amazon and Ebay.</p>