<p>That’s the access to the online homework systep, Sapling. You have to purchase it, unfortunately.</p>
<p>@pancaked you must get some kind of award/reward from the parents and Vandy for the help you are providing. THANK YOU. Still working on my book buying strategy … So buying used books is preferable from ebay etc. I get that. In the case of Chemistry , the book plus solution manual is close to $200 on various sites whereas Vandy BN has for $215 (used). Does Vandy BN spiral book have any resale value ? Does Vandy BN buy books back ?</p>
<p>I enjoy helping out! </p>
<p>The spiral book may have some resale value to incoming freshman, but is unlikely to have much resale value online, being a unique ISBN from Vandy and kind of a strange item. Vandy BN does buy back books (that’s where the used stuff comes from), though it’s usually a pretty terrible deal in my experience. There are also various services with student representatives that buy back books – your son/daughter will see students post about it towards the end of the year. Usually offers more money than Vandy BN. I’ve always found the best way to resell is through Amazon’s buyback program. Again these other options will be fine if you purchase the textbook but will not work for Vandy’s spiral thing.</p>
<p>Don’t forget renting as an option – sometimes it is cheaper and more convenient to rent online than buy/return, if you’re certain you don’t want to keep the book (I can’t imagine keeping General Chemistry, students will probably never want to see the book again). Here again Vandy B&N has pretty high prices on rentals and you can often find better online.</p>
<p>I’ve used booksprice.com in the past to compare prices on rentals, international editions, etc. There are a lot of search engines like this-- not sure how/why I came to use this one in particular, but it works well.</p>
<p>For those of you plan to drive to Vanderbilt for move in day, do you order the books to be shipped to your home and then take them with you to Nashville? Or do you have them shipped to school? </p>
<p>Would it be dumb to buy the books from B&N?</p>
<p>I didn’t buy the solutions manual and I don’t recall anyone who did.</p>
<p>Last year we bought a new Chemistry book from Amazon for $150. It was used for 2 semesters and sold back to Amazon for around $130. Much cheaper than if we had rented it. You take a risk because a new edition may come out and the book becomes less valuable. </p>
<p>If a book is going to be used for more than one semester, it generally makes sense to buy it. My student did not buy the solution manual. He told me most of the problems are in Sapling. The solution manual would help if you did a lot of extra problems to study.</p>
<p>Buying from B&N is really convenient and a great idea if saving some money on your textbooks isnt important to you.</p>
<p>Thanks @Pancaked ! </p>