Textbooks

Yes, to continue the theme of the new academic year, yesterday found me doing something familiar, getting textbooks, but in an unfamiliar way. Not only do I pick out texts for my own students, but I found myself scouring the Internet for the textbooks that I need this semester for the class I am taking. Buying my own texts is very unfamiliar, for the school I attended as an undergrad and grad student offered a rental system, which was great! The cost of textbooks has always been expensive; I really appreciated paying a small fee (it was about $75 for the semester) to rent the textbooks I'd use, and since I was an English major (which requires many books per course), I really came out ahead.

The classes I take now (mainly courses on teaching composition and composition theory) are at a different school, and I am on my own for finding books. Which has lead me to the Internet looking for used books from sites like Amazon, half.com, and such. How times have changed from when you would take your list to the campus bookstore and pay full price for the books they had. Oh, and it's a nice change! My books should arrive at my house in a week or two and were at least half as expensive as they would have been new.

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textbooks, academia, classes, composition