Text Rental Committee Takes Shape
Text books from text rental come with an informational slip. Photo by Emily Hoffmann.

Text Rental Committee Takes Shape

College students fear how big a dent textbook purchases will make on their bank accounts.

Katie Cronmiller, the Student Government Association vice president, said she hopes to establish a Text Rental Committee that would mandate fees and take some of the financial burden off students.

“The policies mandating text rentals haven’t been updated in years,” Cronmiller said. “They’re outdated and are costing students a lot of money.”

Cronmiller said the purpose would be to establish policies more representative of today’s generation. This could mean using online resources that could be continually updated.

“Books are way too expensive,” said senior Nicole Mussell. “This semester I spent close to $150. Sophomore year it was closer $300.”

Depending on each student’s situation, many find no issues obtaining the materials necessary for their course load.

“I think the policies are fine,” said junior Bailey Matthys. “The fees are integrated into tuition and this semester I spent less than $100 on supplemental books.”

Many students admit if their budget does not allow it, they will look for loopholes around spending the money. This often results in students not completing the assigned textbook readings.

“About 50 percent of my class hasn’t bought the book required for our class,” said a student who wished to remain anonymous. “We normally just depend on the PowerPoint slides.”

Options are available to rent or borrow books from websites like BookRenter or Amazon.

“This semester, I had to buy five supplemental books, which is the most I’ve ever had to find in my nine semesters here,” said natural resource policy major Melissa Haack. “I found them for only $90 on AbeBooks, but they were used and had a ton of writing in them.”

The new Text Rental Committee would consist of four faculty members, four students and two auxiliary members to reevaluate the policies. Cronmiller is still looking for faculty members, but hopes to establish the committee within the coming year.

 

Sophie Stickelmaier
Reporter
sstic520@uwsp.edu

About pointer

Avatar

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

*