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Cornell University Library

Textbook Initiative

Tobi Hines, Head of Operations & Outreach, Mann Library

Wendy Wilcox, Access Services Librarian, Olin & Uris Libraries

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Cornell Library Strategic Priorities

Student Experience
Research Life Cycle
Global Impact
Diversity and Inclusion
Work Prioritization

“The Library will focus on providing an outstanding experience for all students who access its amazing resources, whether physically or online.”

Our Vision

Empowering Cornell's research and learning community with deep expertise, innovative services, and outstanding collections strengthened by strategic partnerships.

Our Mission

Cornell University Library promotes a culture of broad inquiry and supports the University’s mission to discover, preserve, and disseminate knowledge and creative expression. It engages with the ongoing transformations of society to deliver world-class physical and digital content and services critical to research, education, and outreach, now and in the future. The Library acts globally, supporting Cornell’s land grant mission in New York State and beyond, and builds partnerships within and outside the university. It invests in its staff, collections, and physical and virtual libraries. And, it serves as a neutral and trusted party supporting information access and scholarly communication.

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Textbook Affordability

College textbooks are one of the largest out-of-pocket expenses for students and their families, and the high price tag is yet another hurdle to affordability and accessibility of higher education in the United States.

According to College Board, the average student spends $1,200/year on textbooks and supplies.

New textbook prices underpin the entire college textbook marketplace and continue to grow at an explosive pace. Over the past decade, textbook prices have increased by 82% - an increase of 3x the rate of inflation.

https://trends.collegeboard.org/college-pricing/figures-tables/average-estimated-undergraduate-budgets-2017-18

$1200/year = 39% of tuition at community college and 14% of tuition at a public 4-year institution

For many students and families that are already struggling to afford college, $1,200 per year on textbooks is simply too much -- forcing them to incur more debt, work longer hours, or make choices that undermine academic progress.

During the fall of 2013, the Student Public Interest Research Groups (PIRGs) - independent statewide student organizations - conducted a survey of 2,039 students from more than 150 different university campuses. Here are the major findings:

High textbook costs continue to deter students from purchasing their assigned materials despite concern for their grades - 65% of students said that they had decided against buying a textbook because it was too expensive; 94% of students who had foregone purchasing a textbook were concerned that doing so would hurt their grade in a course.
High textbook costs can have a ripple effect on students’ other academic decisions. Nearly half of all students surveyed said that the cost of textbooks impacted how many/which classes they took each semester.
Students want alternatives, expressing support for textbooks that are available free online and buying a hard copy is optional. 82% of students felt they would do significantly better in a course if the textbook was available free online and buying a hard copy was optional.

Fixing the Broken Textbook Market: How Students Respond to High Textbook Costs and Demand Alternatives (2014). US PIRG Education Fund & Student PIRGs

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Textbook Task Force

Cornell University Library (CUL) aims to provide whenever possible required textbooks for any course taught at Cornell through the library course reserve system.

The CUL Textbook Task Force will draw lessons from current CUL programs that provide textbooks in print or electronic forms and from other libraries that provide and sustain such a service. It will consult campus partners who play a role in supporting this service. It will recommend options to Library Administration on piloting, scaling, and developing this into a CUL service over a manageable time frame by describing approaches, timeframes, and associated staffing, materials, systems, or any other costs.

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Textbooks @ Cornell

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Cornell Lending Library, Durlands Alternatives Library

This new initiative provides free loans of textbooks to students challenged by high textbook prices.

“We are dedicated to improving the educational experience of low SES students by providing free semester long loans of textbooks in a lending library.”

www.alternativeslibrary.org/lendinglibrary/

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Instant Access Program, The Cornell Store

The Instant Access program delivers digital course materials to students at lower-than-market prices.

“Students enrolled in an Instant Access course receive their digital course materials, either e-books or publisher created software, on or before the first day of classes.”

www.cornellstore.com/instant-access-program

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Open Textbooks/Educational Resources

Cornell Faculty Handbook encourages faculty to help minimize students’ textbook expenses.

“Faculty should take advantage of technological resources that can alleviate textbook expenses, including free electronic versions of text and open access materials when available.”

www.theuniversityfaculty.cornell.edu/the-new-faculty-handbook/6-policies-and-assistance/6-1-instruction/required-course-materials/

Open Educational Resources (OER) are educational materials and resources that are publicly accessible--meaning that they are openly licensed and available for anyone to use.

Cornell Faculty Handbook encourages faculty to help minimize students’ textbook expenses in a variety of ways:

Early textbook adoptions enable students to explore multiple purchase options and give students broader access to used books
Faculty should indicate on their course syllabi and inform the store whether students can use an earlier edition of a required textbook
University libraries can help ensure that enough copies of every required text are available through the course reserve system
Course syllabi should indicate the frequency that students will be using required textbooks so that students can decide whether to purchase or rent the textbooks or rely on the course reserve system
Faculty should take advantage of technological resources that can alleviate textbook expenses, including free electronic versions of text and open access materials when available

On many campuses, faculty members have championed open textbooks – but widespread knowledge about available materials is lacking. Additionally, it often takes time and effort to make the switch to an open textbook. The single most effective way for campuses, state, and federal policy makers to overcome this challenge is to provide faculty with the resources they need to make the switch - this is an opportunity for libraries. Many academic libraries are supporting alternative textbook iniatives to encourage faculty to replace their commercial textbooks with alternate resources such as OER and licensed library content (which is openly available to all the members of that institution).

The development or adoption of open or alternative resources may include any of the following or a combination:

An existing open access textbook (see Resources to Find Open Textbooks)
Library resources
High quality open educational resources (OER) - Open Educational Resources are teaching, learning, and research resources that reside in the public domain or have been released under an intellectual property license that permits repurposing by others.
Multimedia resources found on the open web (e.g., TedTalks, YouTube videos, Wikimedia Commons)
Faculty-authored open access materials

We have found that some Cornell faculty are using OER or open textbooks for their courses - one notable example is Introductory Statistics (https://www.openintro.org/stat/textbook.php?stat_book=os) but there is an opportunity here for the library to help support faculty in a more systematic way.

NYS SUNY OER Funding Initiative

For fiscal year 2017 – 2018, SUNY was given $4 million by the state of New York to implement Open Educational Resources (OER) in high-enrollment, general education courses. All SUNY campuses are eligible to receive these funds. The criteria for receipt of allocation monies are: 1) A commitment to convert a class, or classes, to OER and maintain the redesigned course for three years. 2) Develop a sustainability model for OER on your campus. 3) Share enrollment and savings data for your OER courses.

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Textbooks @ Cornell Library

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Course Reserves @ Cornell

Course reserves at Cornell are faculty-initiated -- faculty submit a request via Blackboard. Item is placed on short-term loan (typically 2-4 hours) at a unit library. Checked out items will be recalled. Items not currently owned by the library will be ordered.
Historically, the libraries place about 5500-6000 physical items and 1500 electronic items on reserve each semester.
Typically, courses have between 1-5 items on reserve; however, there are courses that have up to 60 items on reserve. Most items circulate very little. In Spring 2017, 55.3% of the items we placed on physical reserve did not get checked out at all!

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NEW! Student Textbook Requests

Pilot program flips the model by allowing students to request textbooks for reserves
In the past, when students couldn’t get their texts at the Library, we would tell them to ask their faculty to submit a request
We hope to see an increase in usage of the items we put on reserve since students are telling us what they want

www.library.cornell.edu/reserves/textbook-request-form

Current stats:

92 requests

33 graduate student requests
2 staff requests
55 undergraduate requests

Most requests in:

DEA 10

ECON 4

ENGL 7

GOVT 5

PHYS 7

Engineering 13

Languages 6 (ARAB, FREN, SPAN)

14 students submitted multiple requests

69 requests were for textbooks that the library ALREADY OWNED

21 requests were for items the library did not currently own

Of the 92 requests we received, only 19 were already requested to be placed on reserve by the faculty member

71 requests for material that faculty had not placed on course reserve

We have currently purchased 54 textbooks for this pilot (if the item already owned by the library was checked out, we purchased another copy for this pilot)

Challenges moving forward:

Fix workflow issues for course reserves. If we don’t get a request until the start of the semester, we are paying an increased cost to rush the item. Then it sometimes takes 5-7 days to receive the item, process it through Technical Services and via our Course Reserve System, and make it available via the reserve desk.
Length of time for short term loans. Is 2-4 hours enough time?
How many copies should the library provide for each course? Based on enrollment?
Space issues if we create a permanent collection of textbook reserves so those items do not get checked out for long-term loans or sent out via Borrow Direct or ILL.
WHAT are the most important items to purchase and place on reserve?
Is the student-initiated model enough to capture the holes in the faculty-initiated reserves model?
What is the best way to promote this service? (posters in dorms, handouts at orientation, parents’ newsletter)
Should we do something differently?

Requests by department:

AAS 2

AEM 3

ANSC 1

ANTHR 1

ARAB 1

BIOMG 1�BME 1

CEE 1

CHEM 3

CHEME 1

COMM 1

CS 1

DEA 10

EAS 1

ECE 3

ECON 4

ENGL 7

FDSC 2

FREN 3

FSAD 2

GOVT 5

HA 1

HD 1

HIST 2

LAW 1

LING 1

MAE 4

NACCT 2

NS 1

NTRES 2

ORIE 3

PADM 2

PAM 2

PHIL 1

PHYS 7

PSYCH 3

SPAN 2

STS 1

WRIT 1

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Student Textbook Requests UPDATE

92 requests as of 10/15/18. 55 from undergraduates, 33 from graduate students and 2 from staff.
Most requests in following areas:

13 in Engineering
10 in Design and Environmental Analysis
7 in Physics
7 in English
6 in Languages
5 in Government
4 in Economics

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Student Textbook Requests UPDATE

14 students submitted multiple requests
69 requests were for textbooks that the library ALREADY OWNED
21 requests were for items that the library did not own
Out of the 92 requests received:

71 were for courses that faculty had not submitted courses reserves to the library
19 requests were for material already on reserve at the library

The library purchased 54 textbooks for this pilot.

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Questions?

Tobi Hines eeh53@cornell.edu

Wendy Wilcox ww83@cornell.edu