Textbooks are considered to be one of the biggest unspoken scams of the university ‘industry’, making the black market trade in textbooks something to be a source of continual anger and lawsuits of exploitative publishers seeking to profit off of students. However, this has changed a lot with the Internet, as textbooks have become more easily accessible and cheaper to the point of being freely distributed. Now one university seems to be expanding on this trend by ditching textbooks all together and replacing them with free online resources.
A new initiative at Bethel Univesity is working to reduce student costs by ditching textbooks.
Funded by a two-year Strategic Growth Award grant from the Bethel University Foundation, the Zero Cost Course Resources Initiative eliminates expensive textbooks and replaces them with free online resources.
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According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the cost of college textbooks increased by 88% from 2006 to 2016.
Bethel University estimates the initiative will save students approximately $1,300 per year in textbook costs. (source)