PRIMIS Online Textbook

CUSTOM TEXTBOOKS BECOME A MATTER OF COURSE Janita Poe, Tribune Staff Writer CHICAGO TRIBUNE Like other instructors, Margaret Redmond has never been fully satisfied with the anthologies for English 101 teachers. So this school year, the Joliet Junior College teacher decided to cobble together her own text. From a publisher's database of 700 works, Redmond selected 30 poems and essays, including out-of-the-ordinary items such as Martin Luther King Jr.'s "I Have a Dream" speech and William Faulkner's Nobel Prize acceptance speech. She completed the 200-page, softbound text with another unusual touch, an excerpt from her novel. Next term, Redmond plans to go one step further by adding compositions by a few rookie authors-her former students. "I like it," said Redmond, whose "Accommodating Reader" was made available last fall just 72 hours after she had requested it from the Primis custom publishing division of McGraw-Hill Inc. "I think I have more quality literature in the book I put together than in the (other) books." College students are using more textbooks prepared by professors with the computer-based help of a publisher, college bookstore or nearby printshop. These "instant" texts or "coursepacks" are part of a small but burgeoning customizing trend in the $3 billion-a-year college textbook industry, publishers say. Custom-designed texts are hot off the presses with the latest research and writings. Because the instructor is the one who "builds" the texts, they also include material relevant only to a particular course. The books are popular with students because they tend to cost less than the traditional tomes. The textbook for an accounting course at Governors State University used to sell for $65. Now that it is customized, the price is $50. Area college bookstore managers estimate that from 5 to more than 20 percent of their course listings include some form of customized materials. The University of Illinois at Chicago, Wheaton College and Illinois Benedictine College in Lisle are among the schools that have print-on-demand books. "Everybody makes out very well," said Mark Harrop, spokesman for Primis, which will be one of the participants in the National Association of College Stores' first Custom Publishing Conference on Feb. 4-5 at the O'Hare Ramada Inn. "It's usually about two-thirds to half of the cost of a standard textbook, but you end up with many more textbooks' worth of information, plus magazine articles and everything else." John Santrock, a professor at the University of Texas at Dallas, initially had concerns about having faceless instructors across the country abridge his "Psychology: The Science of Mind and Behavior," transforming it into a print-on-demand text. But Santrock, whose book is published by Wm. C. Brown Communications Inc., said he has come to like the custom-publishing idea because it gives other instructors flexibility with his book without resulting in any major modification of his work. "They're not really rewriting any of my material," Santrock said. "There choice is whether or not to use a whole chapter." But not everyone is convinced that electronically published opuses are the wave of the future. James Lichtenberg, vice president of the higher education division of the Association of American Publishers (AAP), says many publishers are raising questions about quality control. Some are concerned instructors might not teach important material if they have too much control over their books. Others point out that while traditional texts are critiqued by a team of experts in the field, instant books seldom must pass any type of review. "It's all happened so fast," said Lichtenberg. "There are major issues of quality that haven't been addressed with regard to these kinds of books." Some say the multifaceted custom-publishing trend makes it easier for professors and publishers to circumvent copyright laws. Mark Litzsinger, president of the River Grove-based Follett Corp. division that handles custom-textbook publishing, says copying course materials grew rapidly during the 1970s and 1980s because of the growth of college copying centers. Because of this, many professors ignore or are ignorant of copyright laws. "Whether they know it or not, there's a lot of illegal copyrighting being done," said Litzsinger, whose division specializes in organizing coursepacks and verifying copyrights for them. Primis, created in 1990, solves the copyrighting problem by securing rights for the works it has in its database. The company charges the school for the books and copyright fees. It also distributes the royalties to authors. It reviews its compilations for possible copyright violations before publication. The idea of tailoring a course is nothing new to academia. Instructors have been providing photocopied or mimeographed handouts and supplemental materials to students for years. But computer technology has made the process faster, cheaper and more efficent. The Harper College bookstore in Palatine recently had "shrink-wrapped" packets prepared by the store and ringbound books written by professors, as well as several custom-designed texts made for instructors by national publishers. Spanish professor John Davis has been compiling his introductory reference books for a decade with the help of the Ginn custom publishing company in Maine. "It has stuff that I think is essential," said Davis, who heads Harper's foreign language department. "It's what they need to know, and I'm able to put it together myself." In addition to their relative affordability, students who have used the books say customized texts give more focus to the class. Beverly Bell, a freshman at Joliet Junior College, said she thinks Redmond did a better job of teaching her course because she had built the book. "In the way she described each story, she really made a connection with the class," said Bell, 18, of Wilmington. "It puts the teacher and the student closer. It's a good tool because you don't have to work with the big, heavy books that have a lot of the jumble that doesn't concern you." Bell, however, said she was not so pleased with the book after the course. She said the instant textbook was instantly out of date. "I tried to sell it back at the bookstore and I couldn't," she said. Though bound customized texts are the newest form of print-on-demand course materials, the majority of instant course compilations continue to be packets ordered by professors and put together by the bookstore or copy center. Custom-designed texts typically are used for only a handful of courses, most often basic accounting and English and to a lesser degree sociology and psychology classes. But every term, area college bookstores put together dozens of coursepacks or special compilations. Industry officials said it's too early to determine just which form of instant course materials will dominate the market, but they are convinced the use of some type of customized materials will eventually outpace that of standard texts. James Lichtenberg, vice president of the higher education division of the Association of American Publishers, said he considers the use of customized books an "intermediate phase" in electronic publishing. He predicted college textbook publishing will soon involve regular use of CD-ROM, textbooks on disks and the downloading of information directly from a publisher's computer to that of a college bookstore. "I think there will be a blend of different commodities over the next two decades until the market sorts it out," Lichtenberg said. "It's really a function of what professors feel works best . . . and what students like."