1. Textbook affordability initiatives
Wright State University Board of Trustees
Friday, October 6
Berry Room, Wright State Nutter Center
Dan Krane, Professor of Biological Sciences, Vice President of the Faculty Senate, Chair of the University’s Task Force on Affordability and Efficiency

2. Textbook costs
Wright State students spent $4,662,853 on textbooks purchased at our bookstore for the academic year.
Students saved 21.8% ($1.2M) relative to list-price with used, rental and digital options.
Textbook costs have increased by 945% since 1978.
Nationwide textbooks cost 26% of the cost of tuition at state universities and 72% of the cost of tuition at community colleges.
$4,257,853 at the Dayton campus bookstore, $405,000 at the Lake campus. Cost of texts purchased through wholesalers like Amazon.com are not included in this total.

3. Governor’s Task Force on Affordability and Efficiency in Higher Education
“All institutions of higher education in Ohio must explore means of reducing the cost of textbooks and report annually on their progress in that area.”
October 1, 2015.

4. WSU Undergraduate Student Government resolution
Specifically “urges the Wright State University faculty to consider less-expensive course materials without compromising the quality of instruction.”
Spring, 2017.

5. WSU Faculty Senate
Undergraduate Student Success Committee charged to “develop additional strategies to reduce the cost of textbooks so that a report can be made to the Faculty Senate at its first meeting of the academic year.”
Spring, 2017.

6. WSU Faculty Senate resolution
“No policy or administrative action should in any way impinge upon an individual instructor’s ability to choose whatever textbooks and other teaching materials (e.g. software, course notes, etc.) they have determined to be most appropriate for the classes that they are assigned to teach.”
WSU University Policy

7. WSU Faculty Senate resolution
Recommends a four-pronged approach to reducing textbook costs:
Inclusive Access
Auto-adopt
Incentivize faculty to adopt and/or adapt Open Education Resources
Support efforts to make textbooks exempt from state sales tax
Synergistic, cumulative savings of more than 50 to 70% of current textbook costs.

8. Inclusive access
Institutions negotiate reduced prices and collect that money through their Bursar’s Office
Students must be able to opt out
Payment made to publishers based on census at 30 days
Students realize lower costs and convenience – and better course outcomes
Faculty expect all students to have materials on day one
Publishers get a smaller margin but much better saturation
Relatively little cost to institution

9. Inclusive access pilot
Eight spring 2018 classes touching roughly 1,500 students
Students must be able to opt out
Payment made to publishers based on census at 30 days
Courses identified as “Inclusive Courseware”
Savings to students of almost $75,000
Manual opt-out for spring 2018
Integrated with Banner for 20 courses in fall 2018
Expanded to at least 200 courses in spring 2019

10. Inclusive access pilot

11. Auto adopt
Federal law requires textbooks to be identified not later than the time that students can first register for a course
For spring 2018, November 2
WSU’s compliance has been improving but is still less than 45%
Auto adopt would allow the bookstore to assume that an instructor will use a particular text if:
They have taught the course in the past two academic years
They have not selected a text by the deadline
Faculty will be able to change the book choice even after a selection is made

12. Incentivize use/creation of OERs
Open Education Resources
Successful programs at Ohio State, Ohio University and Miami University routinely see a 10 to 20-fold recurring return on one-time investments
Create an ad hoc OER resources committee modeled after Miami’s and use up to $10,000 to incentivize faculty to adopt and/or adapt OERs for high enrollment courses

13. Make textbooks exempt from state sales tax
State sales tax in Ohio is 5.75%
Wright State students paid approximately $250,000 in sales tax on course materials in
More than 100 things are exempted from state sales tax in Ohio
Textbook sales are tax exempt in 22 states
HB 308 and HB 337

14. Textbook costs
Wright State students spent $4,662,853 on textbooks purchased at our bookstore for the academic year.
Students saved 21.8% ($1.2M) relative to list-price with used, rental and digital options.
Students would be expected to save 50 to 70% ($2.3 to $3.4M) relative to list-price if the textbook initiatives were in place for the academic year.
$4,257,853 at the Dayton campus bookstore, $405,000 at the Lake campus. Cost of texts purchased through wholesalers like Amazon.com are not included in this total.

15. Textbook costs
Wright State students spent $4,662,853 on textbooks purchased at our bookstore for the academic year.
Students saved 21.8% ($1.2M) relative to list-price with used, rental and digital options.
Students would be expected to save 50 to 70% ($2.3 to $3.4M) relative to list-price if the textbook initiatives were in place for the academic year.
Students would save at least $300 M annually if our initiatives were adopted statewide.
$4,257,853 at the Dayton campus bookstore, $405,000 at the Lake campus. Cost of texts purchased through wholesalers like Amazon.com are not included in this total.

16. Textbook affordability players
Textbook affordability working group: David Baugham (Student Government president); Austin Rains (Student Trustee), Thomas Fenton (chair of the Faculty Senate Undergraduate Student Success Committee); Jennifer Gebhart (manager of the Wright State Bookstore); Carol Herringer (History); Nova Lasky (director of strategic initiatives and stakeholder relations for the Vice President of Business & Finance); Jamie Norris (director of auxiliary services for Business Services); Craig Woolley (CIO).
Inclusive Courseware implementation group: Steve Sherbet (Bursar); Amanda Steele-Middleton (Registrar); Daniel Palmer (Student Government); Amy Barnhart (Financial Aid); and several members of the working group.