“Books are almost as much as tuition,” said Joanne Kinzy, who is the director of Disability Services at Camden County College. With websites like Chegg, Amazon, and Skoobit, students are finding alternate way of purchasing and/or renting textbooks to eliminate the high cost of furthering their education. Websites like Chegg are eliminating the worry for students of being stuck with textbooks after the semester is over, and reducing the deep hole in their pockets. The 214th Legislature of the State of New Jersey, “authorizes public institutions of higher education to establish textbook rental programs” effective immediately.
Camden County College’s bookstore was without students on Thursday afternoon with the exception of campus security purchasing a candy bar. Joanna Colameco, the assistant manager of Camden County’s bookstore, said that in the Fall 2010 CCC will be offering a textbook rental program. Just like these websites, a credit card is needed in order to rent textbooks just in case the textbooks that are rented are not returned, the student will be charged for the book.
According to Joanne Kinzy, teachers at CCC have a commitment to use textbooks for their curriculum for 3 years because if the teachers change the textbook they use every semester or every year, there is a minimal amount of used books for students to purchase. Therefore, limiting students to only purchasing new textbooks which are expensive compared to the cost of used textbooks.
Joanne Kinzy also stated that this affects Camden County students who are blind or dyslexic. Some of the new textbooks don’t offer a recorded version of the textbook to help the student learn the material. CCC then has to contact Recording for the Blind and Dyslexic and/or Screen Reader, companies who record textbooks, to get a recording disk or download for the student.
Camden County College has also joined with WhyWaitForBooks.com, which gives students who register early for classes the option to order their books online where they can be shipped to the student’s home or can be picked up at the campus bookstore. This gives the students incentive to register early so they can get first dibs on used books, and won’t get stuck with having to buy new books.
