A
funny thing happened when an instructor at Calhoun Community College in Alabama
allowed his summer-term students to choose between buying traditional textbooks
or buying e-books for a tablet, which they’d also have to acquire on their own.
All of the students, according to the Decatur
Daily, went the digital route.
That
belies the conventional wisdom that says college students prefer printed
textbooks because paper pages are easier for flipping around and making
notations. It should be noted, all things were not equal with the students’
options in this situation. The e-books, complete with supplemental materials,
cost $100 for the term while the traditional texts would have run $300-$400,
depending on new or used, if purchased from the campus bookstore.
However,
the need to buy or borrow a tablet should have tipped at least a few students
toward choosing print. The expense of computer hardware, so say the experts, is
a hardship on some students—even more so at community colleges—and therefore
poses a significant barrier to more widespread student use of digital course
materials.
Instead,
instructor Scott Throneberry told the paper, his students shopped for used
devices online. Five students snapped up previously owned tablets for around
$50 each on eBay.
For
decades, college students have sought out used print textbooks to save money.
Now it appears they may switch to scooping up used devices for the same
purpose.
