As textbook prices continue to rise, students at Syracuse University are saving money and turning to online retailers and used books despite the availability of on-campus rentals.

Kyle McQuay, a sophomore international relations and anthropology major, saved about $400 after purchasing his textbooks from Half.com, an eBay company that allows users to buy and sell books. Most of his books were previously used, and he can sell them back once the semester is over, he said.

Though McQuay got most of his books from the website, there were a few he had to purchase from the University Bookstore because they were custom texts.

McQuay said he didn’t utilize the bookstore for the majority of his textbooks because it is too expensive.

The average student will spend about $1,000 per year on textbooks, according to an Aug. 12 Huffington Post article posted online.

Students can save money upfront with rented textbooks, said Kathleen Bradley, textbook and general division manager at SUB. But the majority of textbooks at the bookstore are not available for rent because they are special packages, she said.

There are always students looking to rent their textbooks from the bookstore, Bradley said. The number of textbooks rented so far this semester is not available yet.

‘It’s interesting because books that we thought we’d never rent, students want to rent,’ she said, ‘and books that we have available for rent, students want to buy.’

Bradley said faculty members are still placing textbook orders to be filled even though classes began Aug. 29. Instructors are supposed to tell the bookstore what books they need early on so students are able to go online and see what the ballpark cost will be to take a certain class, she said.

But that is not happening all the time, Bradley said. Though sometimes faculty members are new or need time to figure out what books they need, they often just don’t get their textbook orders to the bookstore on time, she said.

‘It’s not fair to students,’ Bradley said. ‘Students pay a lot of money to come to Syracuse University, and we want them to have the tools they need.’

Bradley said the advantage of buying textbooks from the SUB is the knowledge that students are getting what faculty members ordered for a specific course.

Tablet and e-reader users can access textbooks from their devices, often at discounted prices. Students can save up to 80 percent off textbooks through Amazon’s Kindle Textbook Rental, according to an online July 21 Time magazine article. The textbooks can be rented for a minimum of 30 days and, once rented, are available for use on tablets and smartphones that run on some versions of Apple, Windows and Android operating systems.

McQuay said he would use a Kindle or iPad for textbooks. Though he does not own either device, he said he would purchase one if he could get all of his textbooks on it.

Chelsea Wagner, a junior public relations major, ordered all but one of her textbooks from Amazon.com. She purchased one book from Follett’s Orange Bookstore in Marshall Square Mall because she enrolled in a course on Thursday and needed a book for Tuesday.

Wagner, who is taking two business classes, a public relations class, a history class and an advertising class, said she preferred Amazon over SUB because the books were cheaper and easier to sell back. She has never rented textbooks before and said she doesn’t plan to.

Wagner said: ‘I’m bad enough as it is at selling them back, so I feel like I would rent them and just end up forgetting to return them.’

brvannos@syr.edu 

Published on September 6, 2011 at 12:00 pm

Contact Breanne: brvannos@syr.edu | @bre_vann