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University Reprimands Professor For Assigning Cheaper Textbook (slate.com)
schwit1 writes: California State University at Fullerton brought a grievance against associate professor Alain Bourget recently. It wasn't for poor results or questionable conduct — it happened because Bourget refused to assign a $180 textbook for his introductory linear algebra and differential equations course, instead using one that cost $75 and supplementing it with free online materials. "Bourget maintains that his choices are just as effective educationally and much less expensive, so he should have the right to use them. But the university says that it makes sense for courses that have multiple sections to all use the same textbooks. Both Bourget and the university say their positions are based on principles of academic freedom."
The Fullerton text in question is Differential Equations and Linear Algebra, published by Pearson with a suggested price of $196, but available at the Fullerton bookstore for $180 (used editions for much less). The authors are Stephen W. Goode and Scott A. Annin, the chair and vice chair, respectively, of the mathematics department at Fullerton.
Now it all makes sense.
The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for it to be pitted against a slightly greater evil
I believe that the GP misunderstood the summary's statement of "courses with multiple sections" to mean "multi-semester courses," which I do not believe is the case here -- certainly not for an introductory linear algebra course. Multiple sections means that there are multiple sessions of the exact same class going on at the same time.
As a former professor (in mathematics, even!), I would agree with the initial sentiment. The university should make sure that courses taught are consistent. This may even affect their accreditation. Who is this associate professor to break the uniformity of the students' education?
However, if you read the article, you'll see that the authors of the department-assigned text are the chair and vice-chair of the department. Which is largely unethical in my opinion. (But don't get me started on ethics and the textbook industry...)
During the early 1990's, math textbooks started requiring a graphing calculator. Not just any graphing calculator, but a specific model of the Texas Instruments graphing calculator. If you had a different model or brand, you were on your own as the instructors didn't have time to figure out the four or five other graphing calculators in the classroom. Math textbook and graphing calculator cost $200, which was twice the cost of going full time to the community college at the time.
I went from owning an HP calculator that did Reverse Polish Notation to several models of the TI graphing calculator. I still have them today. Never got around to owning an HP calculator that could take cartridges, say, Missile Command, to extend its functionality. That particular calculator cost $500 or so. More appropriate for the engineering crowd at the university.
Fortunately, I was very much old school towards learning mathematics. When I showed up for an exam without my graphing calculator, I was able to sketch the graph by hand. Other students who forgot their graphing calculator weren't so lucky, as they couldn't graph their way out of a paper bag. I've known several students who dropped out of school because they couldn't afford the latest and greatest calculator for the newest math textbook. The financial aid office came up with a program to help students with buying calculators.
....and in the comments section it mentions that the department started using this book in 1989, 15 years before the author became department chair.
Also, it mentions that the course-approved book rents for much less than the rebel-chosen book.
So obviously there's more to the story than the simple venal corruption that's implied.
- it seems a conflict of interest when a department is *requiring* the use of a book from which the department head(s) directly profit; then again, if my department is using book X, and we can "get" as a professor the author of said book, I'd do it for sure.
- it also seems pretty reasonable that a department would agree to teach from a consistent set of books, especially for lower-level courses, so as to provide a consistent contextual base for all students in later classes; do they do so in other departments?
I don't have any answers to resolve this, frankly.
-Styopa
$180? Are they fucking insane?
The people reprimanding him are the people who chose the $180 textbook, and they also happen to be the authors of that overpriced textbook.
So no, it definitely not that they're insane... Unethical, corrupt and greedy, but not insane.
Fanatically anti-fanatical
As a former university and tech school mathematics instructor, I'm happy to throw in my take on it.
Most textbooks are absolutely dull, and are full of extremely contrived examples designed to "show how useful the subject is". Many subjects are extremely useful, but perhaps to only certain fields, so it's sometimes difficult to explain the utility to a first undergraduate course in the subject. This makes many students bored because they're smart enough to realize they're essentially being lied to -- the examples are obviously contrived and lame. Furthermore, it pushes this idea that unless there's a "practical way to make money" on the subject, it's worthless, which is absolutely not true. We should encourage philosophical thought for its own sake, and recognize that such thought sometimes leads to great discoveries long term, even if we don't know how its useful right this minute.
So that being said, the textbook industry knows Education is a buzz word in politics. They know getting Good Jobs (TM) is another buzzword. So they rewrite the textbooks every year now. The actual content doesn't change (or at least not for the best; I think they often just remove content!), they just swap chapters around, and most importantly, tailor the contrived examples to the buzzword industry of the year. They can then go around convincing politicians, school districts, and universities that their books "prepare students to enter the workforce" and you absolutely need the latest edition or your students won't have the advantage others' do. It's kind of a bullying -- they make the professors feel bad, and if they manage to stand up, then they go to the school board or university administration to get their book in.
To convince people of the book, they spam free copies of the book to everyone. They hand out swag at conferences, reminding them of how awesome they are for publishing. They get name recognition.
Professors then start to feel bad that maybe my students are not receiving the same advantage as everyone else, let me use what they all use. Going through graduate school, I had my share of completely awful textbooks for courses. Couldn't learn a damn thing from them. We asked the professor about it (several different ones for different classes) and the response was almost always "this is the standard textbook nationwide on this topic".
Having a standard breeds mediocrity in some sense. To me, University is meant to open your mind to new ideas. I think they should be a little different between semesters and professors. Shake it up. Cover a few new topics, especially if the students seem interested. Throw out a few topics because maybe there's little interest. Why not tailor it to what the students want, rather than university and accreditation boards? I know, losing accreditation would be bad, but that's exactly my point -- the system has damaged what it means to have a university education. You just go through an assembly line, rather than being encouraged to explore your interested. Classes like linear algebra are amazingly useful, but (1) not every applied field in the world needs it, so I can see some instances where you don't want to cover all the nuances; (2) linear algebra is a very large subject and so even if a student should learn it, the question becomes: what part of linear algebra? What should be the focus of the class? We need professors willing to change it up based on student needs and interests. We're teaching kids how to learn, not rote memory -- if we do a good job, then even if we don't cover everything, students will know how to find and learn what they need in the future!
Finally, many textbooks themselves were not written because of someone's passion to educate, but rather to fulfill a bullet point for a PhD or tenure. Check the introduction/forward of any textbook; most of them will say "This grew out of work I did for my PhD....". It is almost verbatim someone's PhD thesis, but somehow undergraduates are expected to follow a PhD thesis on a subject (remembe