Issue date: 8/30/07 Section: News

Media Credit: Steve Berry A Textbook Services employee looks through shelves of textbooks. Some students have not been able to rent their required books due to a number of different reasons.

Although the fall semester is midway through its second week, many SIUE students are still waiting on books for their classes.

Some are waiting because not enough books were available through Textbook Services or the University Bookstore. Some are waiting because their class is using a new edition of a book that was not published in time for the first day of class. And some are waiting because their instructor placed an order for the book late in the summer, after the established deadline.

Consider the case of Anne Powell, a professor in the Computer Management and Information Systems department whose CMIS 270 class could not pick up their textbook because the new edition she had ordered would not be available from the publisher until October. Powell contacted Textbook Services and resolved the issue quickly, arranging for students to use the previous year's fourth edition instead.

"I told students they could switch to the fifth edition when it comes in if they want," Powell said. "We found out on the first day, and it was cleared up by the second day."

But some students still do not have books.

There are many reasons some titles are not available to students on day one, Textbook Services Store Supervisor Bonnie Elmore explained. Chief among them is the fact that many instructors placed orders for their books after the established deadline of April 1 for books to be used in the fall. Elmore noted that, since the semester began last week, she has received 10 new orders for books.

"Textbook Service's mission is to provide the undergraduate student body with the majority of their textbooks," Elmore said. "Performing this task requires the cooperation of the academic departments and the submission of the book orders and requests in a timely manner."

SIUE offers one of approximately 35 textbook rental programs in the United States collegiate system, Elmore explained. Since the university was founded in 1957, SIUE has used a textbook rental system, charging students a rental fee per semester instead of requiring them to purchase individual textbooks. So far this semester, Textbook Services has supplied the campus with around 72,000 books. The rental program is so successful that the Illinois legislature has mandated that all public universities in Illinois are required to evaluate incorporating a rental program.

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