Courseload eContent Readiness Program:
• Professors opt in without an incentive
• If a professor opts in, the university automatically charges students for that course
• An eText appears through Courseload in Blackboard
• An eText is browser-based and can be read without an Internet connection
• An eText can be up to 65 percent off the cover price of a regular textbook
• Courseload is working on a mobile app, which will debut sometime during Spring Semester
Source: bsu.edu/etexts and Yasemin Tunc, an assistant vice president for academic solutions
• Starting in 2014, Ball State will use a new e-textbook program called the Courseload eContent Readiness Program.
• If a professor opts in, students are charged automatically for an e-textbook.
• Students will access the materials directly via Blackboard.
Instead of scouring Muncie bookstores and online prices, the university will automatically bill students for e-textbooks for some courses.
In the spring, Ball State will formally adopt an e-textbook program, called the Courseload eContent Readiness Program, which places the e-textbook on students’ Blackboards.
Yasemin Tunc, an assistant vice president for academic solutions, said this program is one more option for professors to use e-textbooks.
“Electronic textbooks have been around for quite some time, and I encouraged [professors] to use it because it was so much cheaper than the hardcover textbook,” Tunc said. “It was not a concerted university effort.”
She said seven courses with more than 50 sections have already used eTexts through Courseload. The university has informally offered Courseload to professors, but this coming semester marks the beginning of a one-year contract.
Tunc said it is optional for professors to adopt the program; there are no incentives to participate. She said the new program will add consistency to the university because all students will get the same content.
The e-textbooks are offered at up to 65 percent off cover price. The university also collects a $7 administrative fee per student using Courseload.
Psychology professor Darrel Butler used the Courseload program to host his textbook for three sections of PSYS 100 Intro to Psychological Science this semester.
Butler, who had never used an e-textbook for a course before, signed onto the program because it was cheaper for students and allowed him to include online content through Ball State’s Vizi program.
He said he wants to survey his students on their opinions before committing to the program for another semester.
“I will use the eText for my spring online PSYS 100 course,” Butler said. “But I won’t make the decision about other classes until I have a more complete understanding of the strengths and weaknesses from [the students’] perspective.”
Nikole Darnell, a freshman English major, used a Courseload eText for her MATH 125 Mathematics Applications class and said she hated it.
Darnell, who said she would have likely bought a used textbook, had problems accessing content, among other issues.
“If I stare at a computer screen too long, I get migraines,” she said. “So it was either do math homework and get a headache or don’t do homework. But on the plus side, I never lost my textbook.”
Tunc said most students in college now favor hard copy textbooks, but younger students lean more toward e-textbooks.
“As younger generations start getting into higher grades in school and in college, more electronic textbooks will be adopted,” she said.
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