Senators aim for cheaper textbooks

Senior Wyatt Alberston estimates that he spent close to $400 each quarter on textbooks during his first two years at the UW. In some cases, he didn't use all of the course materials. He also began noticing new editions of books with only minimal changes.

"It's wrong that we're charged these prices," said Alberston.

Alberston now shops for older editions online; this quarter he estimates that he saved about $300.

"I don't think that most students are aware that you can save a ton of money by buying old editions," said Alberston. "I found that most of the recent editions only have minor changes [which] don't really have an impact on what I learn."

Stories like Alberston's have begun to resonate with legislators in Olympia. This year state lawmakers, in coordination with student lobbyists from the state's public universities, are pursuing a solution to a problem that cost American families $6 billion in 2003, according to a study by the Government Accountability Office.

But textbook pricing is a process that involves college bookstores, students, faculty, publishers and federal laws, providing legislators with a complex issue that does not render any easy solutions.

"The cost of supplies should not stand between students and their education," said Sen. Craig Pridemore (D-Vancouver).

Pridemore is the prime sponsor of Senate Bill 6699, which recommends the boards of regents of the state's four-year universities take measures to curb the costs of textbooks.

The bill pushes college bookstores to sell unbundled books to students when possible, to detail to the student body the changes between editions of books and promote buy-back programs.

It also encourages faculty to pick affordable course materials.

The U-Book Store supports the bill, but has raised concerns on several provisions, saying that bookstores don't have the power to follow through with what the bill recommends.

Bryan Pearce, CEO of the U-Book Store, said the bookstore is not notified of changes between editions by the publishers, and the store orders what faculty members ask for, whether bundled packets or single textbooks.

Students wrongly accuse the bookstore for the price of books, and publishers on average reap about 75 percent of a book's cost, Pearce said

Due to interstate commerce laws, Washington cannot regulate what publishers charge for books.

The bill urges faculty members to make choices that will help relieve financial burden, but it's difficult to compare textbooks ahead of time. Sometimes publishers do not provide older editions, said Michael Salvador, a Washington State University instructor and member of the Council of Faculty Representatives.

The Washington Student Lobby (WSL), a group composed of the student lobbyists from the state's public universities, created the bill as a moderate measure to bring to the issue of textbook prices to Olympia.

"It's not the bill to end all bills on textbooks," said Ben Golden, the UW representative on WSL. "Even if the bill does not pass, bookstores now know what we want."