Why do we need a new calculus book every 3 years? Calculus isn’t fucking changing!
There should be one public domain calculus book used by every college and if teachers want new homework problems there should be FOSS software to randomize the numbers and email out fresh problems.
In the US states have reduced their funding for public colleges shifting the burden to students. On top of that universities have more programs and features than they used to. The university I was at constantly operated at a loss.
Low volume and high costs mainly. The printing costs are dwarfed by all the writing, proofreading, layout, editing etc that goes into them. The $300 ones tend to be these massive books with a thousand pages of instruction, problem sets, images, infographics, etc. None of these books are selling a billion copies like 50 Shades of Grey either. The most famous textbooks maybe, but a lot of them would be lucky to sell a thousand copies.
And of course, yes, greedy giant publishing companies. But those companies publish books for many different courses and professors, plus I think they own academic journals as well (which make them way more money and cost way less to publish than textbooks do).
Which is of course ludicrous. Why is education so insanely expensive should include all the materials?
My degree in Australia had some suggested text books, but none of them required it^, and all the content you actually needed was supplied in the course materials.
^ one exception, a computer network admin class had a book for lab instructions. But the library had a set of them sufficient for a lab and limited the borrow duration to 3 hours so you’d check it out, run to class and return it back afterwards every week.
I’ve also seen professors who get kickbacks from the sale of textbooks up to and including professors making their own textbook that they authored a required text for the course.
Are you asking why education is so expensive? It’s because the amount of staff (especially non-teaching admin staff) employed by universities has ballooned way out of control. A modern university campus is basically a miniature city at this point. It has its own police force, hospital, doctors offices, therapists, many different restaurants, laundry services, recreation and entertainment facilities, gyms, climbing walls, libraries (had those forever though), residential buildings, academic study (outside class) facilities… On and on and on it goes.
All of that stuff is paid for by the students through tuition, residence fees, meal plans, and miscellaneous fees. Sure, the construction of the buildings is usually paid for by donations, government grants, or the school’s endowment fund, but the day-to-day operating costs and staffing are all paid by students.
You might then ask how we got here, or why we don’t have a “bare bones university” with none of that extra stuff? Simple: competition between universities combined with student demand. Bare Bones University is not going to attract the top students who already have a ton of better options.
I’ve also seen professors who get kickbacks from the sale of textbooks up to and including professors making their own textbook that they authored a required text for the course.
Nobody is getting rich by writing a textbook. The most likely reason for using a book they wrote is that it includes information they thought was important.
You forgot one factor that’s also highly important: sports. College sports ALONE makes a lot of universities an eye popping amount of cash, and also costs them a boatload too. Couple that with donations and profits from those sports being earmarked ONLY for those sports (can’t use your basketball money to do anything but improve your basketball facilities and pay the staff), and you’re putting a stranglehold on a lot of ways to reduce cost.
I didn’t want to include sports because I live in Canada and sports are so minor they’re basically a non-factor here, yet tuition costs are still insanely high (for international students, which reflects the true cost of education).
up to and including professors making their own textbook that they authored a required text for the course.
one university i was at, the instructor pulling this shit had a tear-out homework section at the back of his book to prevent resale. I was all ready to stab a bitch, but thank the crablord and my parole officer for good breathing exercises. Calms the vinegar.
Why do school books cost $300 each? Cost like $15 to print
Why do we need a new calculus book every 3 years? Calculus isn’t fucking changing!
There should be one public domain calculus book used by every college and if teachers want new homework problems there should be FOSS software to randomize the numbers and email out fresh problems.
Then the professors don’t get to make a cut of the book sales.
There is FOSS software for elearning, Moodle. Just upload your homework to that in any of the many formats it supports.
Same reason as the rest of college being expensive. The can charge whatever they want because the government will loan the money to pay for it.
In the US states have reduced their funding for public colleges shifting the burden to students. On top of that universities have more programs and features than they used to. The university I was at constantly operated at a loss.
Library Genesis is a great resource. No claims about it being legal in your country
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Library_Genesis
Low volume and high costs mainly. The printing costs are dwarfed by all the writing, proofreading, layout, editing etc that goes into them. The $300 ones tend to be these massive books with a thousand pages of instruction, problem sets, images, infographics, etc. None of these books are selling a billion copies like 50 Shades of Grey either. The most famous textbooks maybe, but a lot of them would be lucky to sell a thousand copies.
And of course, yes, greedy giant publishing companies. But those companies publish books for many different courses and professors, plus I think they own academic journals as well (which make them way more money and cost way less to publish than textbooks do).
Which is of course ludicrous. Why is education so insanely expensive should include all the materials?
My degree in Australia had some suggested text books, but none of them required it^, and all the content you actually needed was supplied in the course materials.
^ one exception, a computer network admin class had a book for lab instructions. But the library had a set of them sufficient for a lab and limited the borrow duration to 3 hours so you’d check it out, run to class and return it back afterwards every week.
I’ve also seen professors who get kickbacks from the sale of textbooks up to and including professors making their own textbook that they authored a required text for the course.
Are you asking why education is so expensive? It’s because the amount of staff (especially non-teaching admin staff) employed by universities has ballooned way out of control. A modern university campus is basically a miniature city at this point. It has its own police force, hospital, doctors offices, therapists, many different restaurants, laundry services, recreation and entertainment facilities, gyms, climbing walls, libraries (had those forever though), residential buildings, academic study (outside class) facilities… On and on and on it goes.
All of that stuff is paid for by the students through tuition, residence fees, meal plans, and miscellaneous fees. Sure, the construction of the buildings is usually paid for by donations, government grants, or the school’s endowment fund, but the day-to-day operating costs and staffing are all paid by students.
You might then ask how we got here, or why we don’t have a “bare bones university” with none of that extra stuff? Simple: competition between universities combined with student demand. Bare Bones University is not going to attract the top students who already have a ton of better options.
Nobody is getting rich by writing a textbook. The most likely reason for using a book they wrote is that it includes information they thought was important.
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You forgot one factor that’s also highly important: sports. College sports ALONE makes a lot of universities an eye popping amount of cash, and also costs them a boatload too. Couple that with donations and profits from those sports being earmarked ONLY for those sports (can’t use your basketball money to do anything but improve your basketball facilities and pay the staff), and you’re putting a stranglehold on a lot of ways to reduce cost.
I didn’t want to include sports because I live in Canada and sports are so minor they’re basically a non-factor here, yet tuition costs are still insanely high (for international students, which reflects the true cost of education).
one university i was at, the instructor pulling this shit had a tear-out homework section at the back of his book to prevent resale. I was all ready to stab a bitch, but thank the crablord and my parole officer for good breathing exercises. Calms the vinegar.
Cause all the professors are trying to supplement their income and publishers are also greedy vultures.
yup. they are desperate for passive income.
I mean they don’t get paid that much and younger ones are ironically also trying to pay off student loans/have a life.