Welcome to CRAM FAQs!
Here you will find answers to some of the most common questions we receive. If you have a question that is not addressed here, or elsewhere theCRAM.ca, please contact us and we will answer your question.
Make this an issue on your campus. Approach your student association to see what they’re doing to address the rising cost of academic materials.
Start by becoming informed. Then speak with your bookstore to see how they feel about this issue and what can be done on your campus by working together. Get engaged in the national dialogue by joining the CRAM listserv and members’ forum.
In 1995 the University of Alberta Students’ Union conducted a Price Survey of 196 textbooks. The books selected were chosen because they were stable or common books – they had been used for years by many different instructors and peer universities – and represented standard text books in their respective fields.
In 2007 they revisited the original survey and found that 137 of the textbooks were still being produced and used. They collected the list price for these textbooks and compared them to the 1995 prices. Over the period of 1995 to 200y the price of the 137 textbooks had increased by 75.2%. Inflation for the period of 1995-2006, according to Statistics Canada CPI, was 27.1%. The textbook prices had increased by 280% the rate of inflation.
In November, 2007 the University of Alberta Bookstore and Students’ Union hosted the National Roundtable on Academic Materials (NART) in Toronto, Ontario. Representatives from thirteen Canadian universities and all five major publishing companies attended the roundtable. A national dialogue on academic materials was firmly established. In February, 2008 several of the representatives reconvened, this time under the name of the Canadian Roundtable on Academic Materials (CRAM).
In June 2008 CRAM met in Toronto to transition the new group of student association executives on the academic materials issue. The conference was extremely successful in building upon the energy and momentum created over the previous year and in developing concrete steps to expand the dialogue to more post-secondary institutes across Canada.
Vetting the Key Principles was one of the major tasks accomplished during the summer. With their adoption on August 22nd, 2008 CRAM clearly outlined the direction in which it intends to conduct the dialogue on academic materials.
Current members are expressing the desire to transition CRAM from a periodic conference to a constant forum and database accessible anywhere at anytime. Thus theCRAM.ca was born. Simultaneously, they identified the need to be accessible to every postsecondary institute across Canada. The cost of academic materials impacts all Canadian students; all stakeholders must have the opportunity to be involved in the dialogue that seeks to address this issue. Welcome to your opportunity to be engaged!
The cost of academic materials is an issue that impacts the students on your campus. CRAM will be adapting over the next year to accommodate your participation in the national dialogue. Provide your on the website so that it can grown to better serve your needs. Get involved in the forums to express you point of view. Help CRAM grow to better facilitate that academic materials dialogue in Canada – your students will thank you.
On August 22nd, 2008 CRAM adopted its Key Principles. The Key Principles are the first product of the national dialogue on academic materials and they will guide CRAM’s actions as it strives to address the academic materials issue.
On November 21st, 2008 the General Manager of the University of Alberta Students’ Union gave the following presentation to the National Roundtable on Academic Materials (NART). The call to action was heard loud and clear and over the next six months NART evolved into CRAM.
A. The textbook market is not a normal market, because the people who pick the books (the instructors) are not the ones paying for them (the students). Instructors focus on content and merit when selecting a textbook, and rightly so, but this means that publishers are under little pressure to keep prices low.
Of course, many publishers understand this dynamic and exploit it. Constant edition changes, excessive bundling and aggressive marketing campaigns add further to the overall price of books. Currently, in the textbook market, competition is used as an explanation for the high cost of academic materials instead of causing pressure for publishers to lower prices!
Many publishers change editions very frequently, even in stable subjects such as introductory calculus. These unnecessary changes effectively disrupt the used-books market and force students and instructors to buy new books.
A. Yes, the price of many commodities goes up over time, and textbooks are no exception. However, due to the unique nature of the textbook market, the price of textbooks has been increasing at a rate that greatly outpaces inflation (at the University of Alberta the rate has been observed at an average of 280% between 1995 and 2007).
A: CRAM is still young and a national dialogue is just beginning to grow. It may take years to change the nature and culture of the textbook market. But even in the short term, a little change can go a long way: if one single instructor switches from a $150 textbook to a $100 textbook in a 200-student class, the student population will have saved $10,000. The more we work together on this, the more quickly we’ll start seeing more large scale results.
A. Yes, there are several alternatives to textbooks, that is why CRAM speaks about academic materials in general instead of narrowing in on textbooks. Custom course materials printed on campus are very common alternatives – however the Access Copyright levy on copyrighted course pack materials has increased at an even more drastic rate than textbooks have. Digital resources, such as electronic versions of textbooks, also exist.
A. Check out our Resources Page: you will find documents from CRAM, reports on the academic materials industry and links to even further resources. If you do not find the information you are seeking for Contact us and we will help you seek it out.
A. Check out our Get Involved Page: you will find ways in which you can get involved with CRAM and information about what your peers are doing on their own campuses.
A: According to our current members the benefits they have received include: