N.C. State is on the cusp of a digital textbook takeoff, mirroring bookstore trends across the United States.
In two to three years, the number of digital textbooks offered at N.C. State could be much higher, according to Anthony Sanders, associate director for the NCSU Bookstores. The two forces driving the conversion from print to digital are reduced student costs and enhanced learning outcomes, according to Sanders.
“With digital textbooks, you can negotiate with vendors,” Sanders said. “We can promise to deliver students and increase market share for content providers if they promise to lower the cost of the textbook, so I can see it lowering prices.”
Sanders said the enhanced learning aspects include all the bells and whistles not available with a printed textbook.
“I’ve seen a couple of pilot programs that include ‘adaptive learning,’ which allow professors to evaluate their students’ proficiency before giving a test or quiz,” Sanders said.
Sanders said he is beginning to see a “more dramatic movement” on campus and throughout the country toward digital textbooks, and he expects we’ll reach a tipping point in two or three years. This is true regardless of discipline.
“The use of e-textbooks is scattered now, but I think the saturation of digital texts is spread across all disciplines,” Sanders said.
For example, anyone can visualize how a literature book could be turned into an e-book. However, currently about 1,300 Physics 211 and 212 students have access to an open physics e-textbook, which is offered free online but can be printed for $40.
Sanders said he has been participating in a taskforce of 11 people from college stores throughout the U.S. and Canada as part of the National Association of College Stores. He said he has evaluated several pilot programs, including Educause and Internet 2 E-content, which originated from Indiana University. The Educause program concluded that students currently want reduced textbook prices, prefer to choose their medium (print, mobile, computer, e-reader) and see digital textbooks as “the way of the future,” Sanders said.
Even so, not everyone is a fan of digital textbooks. According to Sanders, 48 percent of students prefer print to digital. Another major setback is that most digital textbooks are limited license and expire after 180 or 360 days.
It’s also possible that a student could rent or purchase a used textbook from the Bookstore or online vendor for much less than purchasing a digital textbook, Sanders said.
Sanders said the Bookstore has already had several meetings with different stakeholders on campus, including Distance Education and Learning Technologies Applications (which is in charge of Moodle and Wolfware), Registration and Records, NCSU Libraries and the CIO, about where digital textbooks are headed at N.C. State.
“Right now, there are several pilot programs we can adapt to easily, and I see us being able to link to the digital textbooks through our LMS [Learning Management System] system, which, at N.C. State, is Moodle,” Sanders said.
Students still could obtain print textbooks, though.
“We’ve brainstormed that if a student wants to keep a hard copy of a digital text, they can use our Wolf Xpress print shop to print a library-quality book for a very low cost,” Sanders said. “We’ve asked students in focus groups how much they’d be willing to pay for something like that, and most students said less than $20.”
It all goes back to giving students a choice of platform, including print, Sanders said.
“I strongly propose student choice offered through the Bookstore’s distribution channel,” Sanders said. “I think we’re on the cusp of a digital textbook boom right now. It’s about to jump to a larger scale.”
