Wanted: Faculty members who teach large undergraduate courses. Have expensive taste in textbooks. Newer editions preferred. Must be willing to make two-year commitment.

The UC Davis Bookstore is inviting those who fit the bill to participate in a pilot project that offers students the option to rent textbooks instead of purchasing them.

Amid growing concerns about the high cost of textbooks for college students everywhere, this pilot aims to save students money — especially when compared with the upfront costs of purchasing new or used textbooks.

Jason Lorgan, book department manager for the campus retailer, said renting a textbook would cost students about one-third the price of a new textbook and about one-half the price of a used one. "We're looking at it as a way to offer choices: new, used, digital or rental," he said.

The bookstore is seeking the participation of several professors who teach large, lower division courses that are offered every quarter. To make the program work for the bookstore, course enrollment must be large, and professors and their departments must commit to using a text for six quarters. For students to achieve meaningful savings, candidate texts should cost about $100 to $150 or more.

Lorgan used the 14th edition of Integrated Principles of Zoology to demonstrate the costs of the options. Students could:

• purchase it new for $148.70;
• purchase it new for $148.70 and sell it back for a final cost of $74.20;
• purchase it used for $111.50; purchase it used for $111.50 and sell it back for a total cost of $37; or
• rent the textbook for about $57.

In the long run, buying a used textbook and selling it back to the bookstore is the least expensive, but the rental does not require the larger initial payment. "For students, the upfront savings is often more important," Lorgan said.

The publishing industry has come under fire for the high price of textbooks and printing new editions without substantive changes. Professors have been criticized for adopting textbooks without considering the cost to students.

In a 2005 study, the California Public Interest Research Group, or CalPIRG, a research and advocacy organization, estimated that students spent an average of $900 a year on textbooks and other course materials. In sample budgets, UC Davis estimates undergraduates will spend about $1,500 on textbooks and other supplies this year.

California recently adopted legislation requiring publishers to make information about textbook prices available to faculty members upon request. And just two weeks ago in Washington, D.C., the House Education and Labor Committee passed the College Opportunity and Affordability Act of 2007, with new provisions that would require information about textbooks — including prices — to be more readily available to faculty and students.

Last spring, representatives of the UC Davis chapter of CalPIRG and an ASUCD committee on textbook affordability encouraged the campus to explore a rental program.

The UC Davis pilot, made possible by a $700,000 upgrade to the bookstore's computer system completed this month, is modeled after a rental program in operation at California State University, Fullerton, for three years. Faculty participation is voluntary, and a limited number of titles are offered as rentals.

This fall, the Titan Bookstore at Fullerton offered 30 textbooks as rentals, and rentals now account for 50 percent to 75 percent of demand for those titles. "Students love it the most, though most faculty are warming to the concept," said Mike Dickerson, textbook adoptions manager for the bookstore.

At UC Davis, Lorgan said the upfront investment in book inventory and the need for storage space can be prohibitive for many campuses.

The UC Davis family of bookstores — including the campus stores specializing in law and veterinary medicine and the medical bookstore in Sacramento — is the largest retailer of used textbooks among North American campuses on the quarter system. In the UC system, it is the largest seller of used textbooks and has the largest buyback program. Last year, the UC Davis Bookstore sold 193,000 new and 142,000 used texts for about $14 million.

The bookstore is prepared to implement the pilot project for the upcoming winter quarter. "If someone was committed to doing it, we have everything in place," said Lorgan, adding that the bookstore would simply place a bar code with an individual serial number on textbooks. "We already have the books."

For more information, contact Jason Lorgan at (530) 752-9075 or e-mail textbooks@ucdavis.edu.