New E-Textbooks Help Students Save an Average of $60 Per Title

Proliferation of Mobile Devices and Advanced Functionality Drives Adoption of E-Textbooks

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Jan 24, 2011, 11:33 ET

WASHINGTON, Jan. 24, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- Newly released statistics from digital course materials provider, CourseSmart.com, show that college students returning to classes this January can save an average of $60 per title by using state-of-the-art e-textbooks. Similarly, Simba Information recently predicted that e-textbooks will grow at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 48.5% by 2013.

"Students are looking for ways to save money and cut costs," said Tom Allen, president and CEO of the Association of American Publishers (AAP). "America's publishers are providing the latest technologies in a variety of formats to help students succeed in the classroom – ranging from online e-textbooks to customized curriculum and books online by the chapter."

Individual publisher websites and e-Textbooks providers such as CourseSmart.com offer more than 90% of the most popular higher education course materials in use today. In addition to lower cost, portability and anytime, anywhere access from any computer or web-enabled mobile device e-textbooks offer advanced search functionality, note-taking capabilities, digital highlighting and the ability to email passages to peers. Students can also purchase their books one chapter at a time on some publishers' websites; buying just what they need, just when they need it.

In addition, students have more options than ever before to access course content by using mobile devices and eReaders. CourseSmart.com developed several free Apps that can be downloaded via iTunes and enables students to access their e-textbooks on an iPad, iPhone and/or iPod Touch.

"Students and educators want quality course materials that work for them," Allen said. "According to research by the National Center for Academic Transformation (thencat.org), the latest course technologies, coupled with course redesign, can decrease dropout rates by as much as 34 percent while lowering the colleges and universities' cost per pupil for instruction by 37 percent."

In addition to CourseSmart's E-Textbooks, students have the option to purchase a broad range of course materials on publishers' websites. The websites of publishers like Bedford Freeman and Worth, Cengage Learning, CQ Press, McGraw-Hill, Pearson, Wiley and WW Norton offer students their books in numerous lower cost formats.

The Association of American Publishers

The Association of American Publishers is the national trade association of the U.S. book publishing industry. AAP's more than 300 members include most of the major commercial publishers in the United States, as well as smaller and non-profit publishers, university presses and scholarly societies. AAP's Higher Education group represents the needs and interests of member publishers who produce instructional materials including textbooks and digital products and services for the post-secondary educational market.

www.publishers.org

SOURCE Association of American Publishers