Alejandra Cruz / Roundup
Professors at Pierce College, recognizing how expensive textbooks are despite their lack of good information, have started writing their own.
During their years of teaching, many professors realized they don’t need a lot of books to give their classes and present the information students need.
One of these professors is Jack Sterk, who wrote “Understanding Argumentation” for his speech classes.
“I can’t charge $90 for a book if my students are going to be giving speeches most of the times,” said Sterk, who has been a teacher for more than 15 years.
His idea was to write a book that covers the content of the class while staying affordable. Because it his own book, he has the flexibility to give a student a book if they do not have the money to buy one.
In a speech class, Sterk said, students need to discuss what they are learning and when the teacher knows exactly what is in the book, they don’t have to lecture “by the book.”
“I think it’s a great idea that the teacher writes the book because we read it and then we discuss what is in the book in class,” said speech student Patricia Cardona.
Anthropology professors Diane Levine and Bruce Rowe wrote “A Concise Introduction to Linguistics” because there was no book that approached a special class like linguistics in an appropriate way.
“Students had to buy two or three books for the class because all we need wasn’t in one book,” Levine said. Their book is a “vanilla” version, as Levine describes it, with few pictures and no color at all — giving the students what they need at a low cost.
On the other hand, a book written by a professor can be beneficial not only because of the cost but also because of the customized content.
“I think a book written by the instructor of their course can be a positive for the students for a number of reasons,” Rowe explained. “For one, it fits to what the instructor thinks is important. Secondly, depending on how the teacher presents the material, it provides a guide to student studying for examinations and quizzes.”
Levine describes the book as a student-friendly introduction to general linguistics, with special attention to linguistic anthropology. She said it is a combination of text and workbook, in that exercises follow explanatory text to help the student process new information.
Linguistic student Mollie Knute said this helps students save money and feels the book is well written because it has a co-writer.
Although they are not planning to write more books, they will keep updating their books once a year. Some of these books are used not only at Pierce but also in other community colleges and around the world. For example, Levine said “A Concise Introduction to Linguistics” has been translated to Korean and is also used in Europe.
These books can be sold back to the Pierce Bookstore for half the new price, or directly to students. But with these affordable books, Sterk said, students don’t lose anything even if they choose to keep it.
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