Free College Textbooks? Yes, Please!
What if you never had to pay for ridiculously overpriced textbooks ever again? Boundless Learning is a new startup based in Boston that is aiming for that very goal. They are currently in the Beta stage, but will be launching shortly.
How it works:
- You as a student select the textbook you were assigned for a class
- Boundless pulls similar text and images from free & open sources around the web
- Voila! A textbook with nearly identical information.. for free!
Hopefully this start-up takes off and saves college students a lot of money! If interested, go to their homepage to sign up for email updates for the latest news.
Also, if you are a current student or even a college graduate, and you have a lot of old textbooks laying around, please use Postify to give away your textbooks, exchange, rent or sell them!
Most Expensive College Textbooks
How much do you spend on college textbooks each year? I found a receipt the other day from one of my engineering semesters for almost $500! I thought it was just because I was an engineering student, but it turns out the average amount a student spends a year on textbooks is between $700 - $1000.
The top most expensive individual textbooks according to a 2010 CBS new article were:
- Acta Philosophorum The First Journal of Philosophy: $1,450
- Encyclopedia of International Media and Communications: $1,215
- Management Science An Anthology: $850
- History of Early Film: $740
- Biostatistical Genetics and Genetic Epidemiology: $665
If you find yourself in a class that requires one of these extremely expensive textbooks, you’re probably better off trying to rent a textbook, or dropping the class entirely,
Or…
You could try your local college classifieds website to see if any other unlucky students had to buy the book last semester, and are now looking to sell. I was able to cut my semester book bill down to about $100 by finding upperclassmen who didn’t need the book anymore.
Another way that you can potentially save a lot of money on your college textbooks is by using an older edition. When doing this, just make sure your professor allows older textbooks.
Saving money in college is essential, so do you yourself a favor and only buy a new textbook if you’ve exhausted all other options to buy a used textbook.
By jvanderwal
