Thinking About Textbooks

This story about a possible corruption case at Arizona State has me looking back and forwards

Wow, some real shady shit going down at ASU with Cengage and the econ department pic.twitter.com/sswgbLoaBH

— Graham W. Jenkins (@grahamwjenkins) April 19, 2019

Of course, the accusation could be without merit.  I am sure journalists in Arizona will pursue this, and I doubt that the Provost in question will have covered his tracks very well if he is guilty. 

I retweeted the story and got some responses, including folks arguing the entire textbook game is rigged with folks using their own or their colleagues' expensive texts.  Well, I have done so a few times, in both ways that I don't feel guilty about and those in which I do:

• I have used my own books in my grad classes--which are too small (along with low rate of royalties) to be motivated by profit.  In these classes, I have taught about stuff I know well--what I have reseached--so using my books makes sense.  I had a prof (Arend Lijphart) who would assign his books and then say he would give the profits to charity.  His books did far better than mine, so, no, I did not get much or give much to charity.
• In my first tenure track job, I had to teach a course way, way outside my expertise--American and Texas Public Policy--I did use my colleagues' text.  Why?  For two reasons: they had banked questions for multiple choice exams based on their book, and I had no experience in writing such exam; AND I did the old trick for teaching a new class of using a decent text to assign the students and an excellent text for myself to build lectures.  Plus I figured I could ask these colleagues for help as I went along.  They made money off of my students, but I didn't feel pressure from them.  Nope, not even as a junior colleague did I think strategically about sucking up for tenure (I have never been good at that).  But I can see how this would be questionable.
• More problematically, our department had a workbook, designed to be used once, for this same class.  The idea was that each new class of students would buy this book, generating income for the department to support the various things the department did (events, travel for grad students, whatever).  But the book was, well, crappy.  So, yeah, I participated in a morally compromising course requirement.  I didn't blow the whistle because it was not too onerous and it was the one job I could get at the time.  I stopped assigning this text once I realized it was not very good.  I have no idea if they developed successors.

Since then, I have mostly avoided using textbooks--assigning monographs and articles instead--and I tend to pay attention to the prices of the books (I have never assigned a book that costs more than $100 and avoid those that cost over $50).  These days, it is a bit less problematic where I am at since the library provides electronic access to most, if not all, of the books I assign.

The story above had three distinct parts to it that are disturbing:

1. The university requiring all classes at a certain level use the same text/digital partner.  While individual profs can make mistakes and can also be corrupt, one key component of academic freedom for me is getting to choose what I do in my classroom.  What I teach, how I teach it, with what materials is up to me.  This is a big difference between university life and K-12.
2. Setting a specific quota for failing students is incredibly unfair and even brutal.  Putting aside the costs of texts for a second, re-taking classes is an onerous consequence for a Provost needing a baseline (if the accusations are true)--this is a big opportunity cost, not to mention causing some students to fail and leave the program.  Which has a lifetime cost attached.
3. The prof got fired.  The university is already saying "we can't talk about it, but the guy committed multiple infractions" to slime the guy.  

To be fair, we have no idea if the accusations are true.  However, it tends to ring true AND I tend to believe academic institutions care more about money than their students these days.  So, we will just have to watch and wait and see what comes of this.