Textbooks: Progress for some, others lagging

Textbook affordability has been a "hot-button" issue in the University System of Maryland, resulting from pending legislation in Annapolis and a Summit held by the USM Board of Regents.  Suffice it to say, faculty, bookstores, and publishers have been questioned and pressured to make the best textbook selections by considering the cost of books in the process.

One of the most basic, but significant changes, is the publication of the universal book identifier, ISBN number.  The ISBN allows students to identify the specific textbook through outside providers in order to shop competitively outside the university bookstore.  At the beginning of the Spring 2009 semester, where do USM institutions stand?

• University of Maryland, College Park, UMBC, and Towson all publish ISBN numbers on their public, bookstore webpages.
• At UMB and UB, the bookstore provides a detailed description, including title, edition, publisher, and author, on their webpage.  Of note, these two institutions do not provide ISBN numbers.
• At Bowie, UMES, and Salisbury, the bookstore simply provides the title of the textbook selection and the author.  No ISBN or edition number is provided.
• At Coppin, there is no online list of textbook selections.
• At UMUC and Frostburg, the bookstore can only be accessed through a student log-in, so I was unable to access the list.

Some progress has been made on "opening" the market of textbooks.  Students at UMCP, UMBC, Towson, UMB, and UB could fairly easily find textbooks outside of the university bookstore, while students at other campuses would struggle to do so.  UMCP, UMBC, and Towson should be commended for taking the progressive step of publishing ISBN numbers.