Textbook Prices: 0 to 100 Real Quick

College student struggles: dining hall food, loans, 8 am classes, no parking spaces, bad roommates, and as of recent, outrageously high textbook prices. I have been back at school for 3 days, and in that time I have put down a solid $700+ on textbooks.

A single textbook could be anywhere from $300-$400 dollars. That is just straight up crazy! That textbook must be made out of paper from the most rare of tress because there is no other reason for why a book should be that expensive.

The saddest part is that as students we have little to no say in whether we choose to buy the texts or not because in the words of many professors they are, “required course materials”. And if the book isn’t required it is “highly suggested”, which is code for “if you don’t buy it you won’t pass”.

Our professors use these books as class notes, and our homework comes straight from them. It’s silly because many classes require the highest and newest edition of a textbook, but yet the changes between that book and the one of the previous year are barley noticeable and extremely miniscule.

Nonetheless, the publishers seem to think that these changes are enough to boost prices sky high. It’s a business, and the numbers are sad.

However, there are ways to avoid losses. A book doesn’t always have to be bought, in fact renting is a way more affordable and an increasingly popular option. Along with that are e-books. Same content, different form, and much more affordable than a textbook. Not only that, but 765 pages that you don’t have to carry in your backpack means many less back problems.

Other options could be sharing with friends, buying from other students, or asking the professor if using previous editions would truly be that detrimental to their class.

Some of my favorite websites to rent or buy used books from are Chegg.com, TextBookRush.com, and Amazon. Gettextbooks.com is another awesome website because it allows you to type in a book name or ISBN number, and it will pull up all of the websites that are offering that book and show them in order in regards to price.

We can only hope that publishers will lower their prices, but in the meantime all we can do is learn to play the game as best we can. Besides, did you really go to college if you didn’t get in debt?