Outrageous College Textbook Costs - Help Is Here - But Is It Working?

College textbook prices are outrageous! In some cases, books cost so much that they are forcing students to skip college all together. The Higher Education Opportunities Act (HEOA) was signed into law in 2008 in an effort to help with this problem. Beginning in July 2010, all college campuses were required to implement these new provisions with reference to textbooks and specifically this problem.

New Provisions:

Provision 1 - ISBN's at Registration: All federal and state financial aid eligible colleges are now obligated to provide students with the ISBN numbers and retail prices for all required and recommended textbooks for each course, before and during the registration process.

Provision 2 - Rental Programs: All colleges are being encouraged to provide students with information about textbook rental programs that are available on campus. While there may be multiple programs out there, the college is only being encouraged to provide information about those that the college has a direct relationship with. There are also many private textbook rental programs available through the internet.

Provision 3 - Used Textbooks and Buy-Back Programs: Colleges are also being encouraged to provide information about the availability of used textbooks and textbook buy-back programs on campus. Again they are only providing information about the university sponsored or college bookstore approved programs that their campus offers. Many others exist, including Amazon.com.

Provision 4 - Other Alternatives: Every college is being encouraged to provide information about current and potential alternatives to high textbook prices. With electronic textbooks and other cost savings strategies becoming more readily available on campus, universities are trying to find ways to inform students and make these alternatives profitable.

Additional Suggestions: The HEOA also offered some suggestions that could help students and professors to find additional textbook savings.

Suggestion 1: It was suggested that the textbook manufacturers are being asked to let professors know the comparative pricing of alternative textbooks before or during the selection process, so that professors can elect to choose a lower cost textbook alternative for students if available. Previously, professors were not given any pricing information about the textbooks that were being recommended by the publishers for their courses. As expected, the recommended textbook was generally the newest and most expensive edition.

Suggestion 2: It has also been suggested that textbook publishers try to avoid minor revisions that cause a previously selected textbook edition to become obsolete, just because a few minor revisions have been made. It has been suggested that this practice has been taking good quality, 3 and 4-year old used textbooks out of the available textbook market. This practice has been growing more and more widespread in recent years as publishers are trying to enhance their revenue stream... at the direct cost to the student.

Summary:

Hopefully the steps taken by the HEOA and others that are coming from outside the campus community will help bring textbook expenses down and allow students to make college more affordable again. Even though these provisions and suggestions have been made public for all colleges that receive federal financial aid, I have not seen a dramatic change so far. My hope is that if more students and parents hear about these changes, the schools, bookstores and publishing houses will be forced to operate with our college students and their families best interests at heart. Only time will tell.

Please share this article with anyone that you believe can benefit from the textbook cost savings that will occur if these provisions and suggestions are properly utilized and enforced.

Keith Maderer is a financial expert, author, speaker and father of five. He has been a financial adviser in the Western New York for over 30 years. He is the owner of SENIOR Financial and Tax Associates and founder of the Maderer Foundation, a private scholarship program for area youth.