Bargaining for textbooks

On Friday, you probably got an e-mail from the IU Bookstore telling you that beginning next fall, bursar billing wouldn't be available to anyone except athletes and recipients of Pell Grants, Stafford Loans, Perkins Loans and Supplemental Educational Opportunity Grants. \nThese students will be able to bill books to their bursar accounts at either the local bookstore or the IU Bookstore. The reasoning goes that these scholarships specifically include textbooks. \nGranted, for the past four years, the IU Bookstore has held a huge advantage in its business. Many students were willing to pay slightly higher prices for the convenience of billing books to their bursar accounts. Now it will have to compete on price alone, which should be good for students. \nUnfortunately, the agreement also presents a big inconvenience to students who now must have $500 ready at the very beginning of the semester to buy books. The IU Bookstore just lost the only advantage it had going. Now more and more students might turn to the Internet and other bookstores that can furnish the books at lower prices.\nIt's tempting to say athletes are just getting another break at a Big Ten university. Maybe they are. It's unspecified whether athletes with partial scholarships also get this special treatment. \nAccording to the e-mail, the bookstore regrets the inconvenience of not being able to offer the bursar billing service to all students. They probably do, especially because they're going to lose business. \nThey also "hope to make this adjustment to bursar billing an easy transition" for us. What a kind sentiment. But the brief e-mail left it there and offered no suggestions as to how it might accomplish this. \nAt least we should be grateful that the bookstore gave us almost four months' notice to prepare. \nIt certainly will be interesting to see what happens at the bookstore next year with prices and business. In one sense, this brings more price competition between T.I.S. Bookstore and the IU Bookstore.\nHowever, the bookstores don't set prices randomly. They have to cover increasing costs for the books themselves. The IU Bookstore Web site lists new technology such as CD-ROMS as a contributing factor in high book prices. \nProfessors and departments have a big role to play in holding the line on textbook costs. If they're not going to require use of the "extras" in class, they should choose another book. Professors shouldn't list texts that they might not fit into the curriculum. Prompt listings of books would allow more students to do comparison shopping, both online and at different bookstores. \nUltimately, we will have to adjust, and we look forward to finding out how the bookstore will make that transition away from bursar billing smoother for nonathletes and those of us without the four specific aid programs.