Persuasive Speech : College Textbooks Too Expensive

Thesis – Free college education is a necessity because college education is considered as one

Attention-getter: How much money have you spent just this year alone on college? Hold on now, did you include all the fees? Living expenses? Your meal plan? Obvioulsy the answer is going to be in the upwards of thousands of dollars. Depressing, I know! College should be a time where you are truly discovering who you are and what you want to do with your life. It shouldn’t be about how you’re slowly but surely giving your life away to student loans. Oh yes, student loans, the mortal enemy of any college student. The college tuition alone is already high enough to put you in debt with student loans for a majority of your life. There are many things that factor into the price of a college education, some reasonable, others however, are a different story. Today, I want to talk to you about the scam that is going on concerning the price of college textbooks. An interesting statistic by The Huffington Post tells us that the cost of college textbooks has increased 253% faster than the cost of college tuition over the decade. How come college textbooks are so expensive? And what can we do to stop this? Well let’s get into it shall we.

Familiarize yourself with the librarian so you will have someone to ask about books you may need for classes. They also have resources for procuring or selling used textbooks.

I. ATTENTION GETTER: Ian Ayres, a professor at Yale Law School mentioned in The New York Times how textbooks and school supplies account to 26% of all student fees in State Universities and in Junior colleges it is about a 72%. Just how much money do we have to put in textbooks in order to get an education.

The cost of college books has tripled in the last 10 years, costing an average of $200 dollars (NIA). College 's will publish their own books, require students to buy them, then update or revise them every year to make the book obsolete causing students to have to by new one 's every year and making the resale of them, nonexistent! College 's will work with publishers and recieve kick backs for using books they publish. Adminstation for college also feel the advantage of higher tuition rates. The president of Yale salary has tripled from $591,709 in 2000, to 1.63 million in 2009.(5) With the average cost of graduating at a 4 year college at $27,293 a year, it is easy to see who is truly profitting from an attending and/or graduated student. Colleges are captializing of students in a poor economy and once out of college, their is no guarentee employment will be waiting.

One of the main reasons why college textbooks are so expensive is because they are overpriced. The publishers set the prices. The bookstore has no control. The publishers of the textbooks are in the habit of bringing new editions quite frequently. Most students hesitate to buy old editions fearing that they will miss out on

Students have number of problems when they are going to college. One of the biggest problem students are facing is buying the textbooks or access code for their classes such as math, science, English, etc. Those students who are freshman they do not realize how much they will be spending for the books and they think they will be only spending $200 but in reality it cost more than $500. Students always seems very confuse, mad and shock after spending this much money on the textbooks. Beginning of semester most of the new students have same question, such as is there any way we can save money from spending so much for these books? is there any website that we can get books for half price? Yes, there

Over the course of the past three years, I have easily spent over $1500 for textbooks alone. With college students on average taking out $20,000 loans to pay for college, the added expense of textbooks should not be so overwhelming. (Perry) Some new books can easily cost over $300 and used books are not much cheaper. With book stores reselling used textbooks for a very large mark-up, the used textbook to a student is still expensive as well. (McDuling)

The article why are text books so expensive by Henry Roediger III is exactly what The title implies and discuss The reasons why college text books are over priced, from the analysis of an author of a psychology text book. Reodiger discusses how some college students and parents of college student have written letters to him inquiring why textbooks are so expensive. they wonder is it because of the amounts of colors in the books or the inflation ad possibly that the smaller companies are now umbrellas by massive textbook companies or the frequent revisions. Reodiger tells us that that these are possible factors, but most likely not at all but the real reason is the sale of used books. he goes on to tell us that this is mostly unnoticed because it all just seems like a good idea, but

`One reason college textbooks should be free is because how expensive they are. The price of a college textbook can start at a hundred dollars. Most students are required to have a few textbooks each semester. So the prices of each textbook will add up and may cost over a few hundred

Currently, there are a few options available for UCC students to obtain their needed textbooks. It is possible to use financial aid funds to purchase textbooks prior to the funds actually being disbursed to the students, but only through the UCC bookstore. Students may also use a textbook in the school library if it is available. Lastly, students can try to find a cheaper version of the textbook from an online merchant, but only if they have the funds up front.

B) One could decide whether to purchase a textbook as new or used. If he/she purchased it new, they would be guaranteed that there are no pages missing and no writing in the book. However, if they purchased it used, they would save a considerable amount of money and have it to spend on some of their other wants/needs. But there is no guarantee on the quality of the book they are purchasing. In this case, I believe more people would choose to purchase a used book.

According to an exploratory study by “Journal and a Higher Education” “Eighty six percent of the students surveyed use more than one source for textbooks. Of those students who rely on only one source, half use the campus bookstore. A majority of students use both the campus bookstore and an online retailer. (McGowan and Stephens,2015, p.85-90)

The seller of digital textbooks will also be saving money over producing hard copies. 32% of the cost allocated to paper, printing and editorial can be completely eliminated along with 22.4% of costs related to bookstore operations and personnel. Bookstores as we know them could become obsolete or transformed into stores that sell tablets, e-readers and software packages on campus. Publishers or sellers will now be able to tap into a more global market with electronic textbooks as the information can be translated into many languages quickly.

Some may think that the only customers of textbooks are the students but that is not the case. There are a variety of customers that buy the textbook before it even reaches the student, someone has to decide what textbook the students are going to be using for which particular course. Business school curricula is changing and therefore their textbooks needs are changing, they want textbooks that cover a variety of information and data in one single, easy to transport textbook. Some school that were moving the modular course structures wanted books that were easy to cover in a course that lasts sometimes as short as a week long. And now, more and