Congressional hearing on textbook prices
Committee listens to companies, students from around U.S. on how to lower cost
By: Stover E. Harger III
Issue date: 4/17/07 Section: News
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Many students pay close to a thousand dollars a year for textbooks, and politicians, faculty, students and even publishers are looking for ways to make textbooks more affordable to students.
From Dec. 1986 to Dec. 2004 the cost of textbooks nearly tripled, according to a United States Government Accountability Office (GAO) report. The report says extra features (CD-ROMs and DVDs), and frequent revisions to textbooks are to blame for the price increases.
A $50 textbook in 1986 cost $143 in 2004, a 186 percent increase in price. Alternatively, inflation increased by 72 percent from 1986 to 2004, according to the GAO.
Jolene Willson, member of the Oregon State Public Interest Research Group (OSPIRG) and coordinator for the Make Textbooks Affordable campaign spoke at the hearing.
"It's important enough that there's people from Congress doing this investigation," Willson said. "Anything we can do to lower the cost of school is a good thing. Publishing companies are ripping students off that are just trying to get an education."
Last year, U.S. Representatives Howard P. McKeon, R-Calif., and David Wu, D-Ore., asked the Advisory Committee on Student Financial Assistance to determine what can be done on the problem of rising textbook prices. Portland was the last stop for the committee before they give their final report on textbooks to Congress this May.
Willson said she has spent upwards of $400 per term on textbooks and has never resold a textbook for more than 50 percent. Faculty can play a huge role in keeping costs down, because they are the ones who order the textbooks, Willson said.
One instructor said she had spent the whole summer researching textbooks from many different companies to find one that was the best value for students. Some instructors use only a few chapters of textbooks and most don't use the supplemental material at all, Willson said.
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