Our Journey, Day 50
Yesterday afternoon I met with the BSU student senate. I spoke briefly about the idea of reducing textbook cost and gave them a little background on the Z-Degree program the state legislature funded, which the system is promoting through grants like the one I got. I told them I'd be going to Mankato next week to talk about open textbooks and Z-Degrees and that I'd fill them in when I return. They will be convening an academic affairs committee, so that might be the appropriate place to get more into the details. But I wanted the entire group to be aware that some faculty are thinking along these lines. I also advised them to get more active (even aggressive) in advocating for their issues. They have been told in the past by BSU administrators that they really have no power and at best can ask the people with the power to consider their issues. This is really not the case. Unless they believe that it is.
The basic overview of textbooks costs I gave them was that based on survey data (and this correlates with national averages), our students in the Minnesota State system pay from $1,240 to $1,440 per for textbooks. Taking an average of $1,250, I talked about the Z-Degree program, which aims to reduce that annual cost to $0. This is a challenging goal, but let's say we were able to create Z-Degree programs in several majors and 100 students were able to graduate without buying a textbook. That would mean annual savings of $1,250 or a total per student of $5,000. For the hundred students, that would be a savings of $500,000. That's pretty good.
But there are a lot more students at BSU or any other MinnState university who would hear about a Z-Degree if a program was offered and want to participate. It won't be possible to shift all their courses over to being textbook cost free, although over time probably more and more of them might shift. But let's say we could cut the textbook expense of a thousand students by half. That would be a savings of $625 per student per year. Or $625,000 per year for the thousand students or $2.5 million over four years. To extend that further, what if we could cut average textbook cost for all our students by only a third? That would be a savings of $417 per student annually. Multiplied by BSU's 5,100 students that would be $2,126,700 annually or $8,506,800 over their four-year undergraduate careers. At a larger school like Mankato, the savings would be tripled. They have 15,000 students; so if they saved their undergrads only a third that would be $6,255,000. Annually. If they saved half it would be nearly $10 million.
So in a sense, the Z-Degree terminology is a bit misleading. The goal of actual zero-textbook-cost for all students in all classes is probably unrealistic and utopian. But the effect of working toward this goal could be huge. This is probably a good life lesson. I wonder if there's a name for it? "Dream big, and even when you fail you'll achieve something pretty cool", or something like that?