BISG's Student Attitudes to Content in Higher Ed

The BISG has released the second installment of their report on student attitudes

Now available to purchase (and at significant discounts for BISG members), Student Attitudes Toward Content in Higher Education, Volume Two, Final Survey Report explores trends and issues in the higher ed market during the 2011-2012 academic year.

This report also integrates some data from BISG’s recent study of Faculty Attitudes, offering a unique comparison between student and faculty perspectives.

Key findings include:

• Nearly 48 percent of students feel Integrated Learning Systems help with their studying; compare that with 45 percent for the core print textbook and just 37 percent for the e-text.
• Although relatively few students have tablet devices — just 16 percent compared with 76 percent who own laptops — many are planning to acquire them, and are looking for course content available on these devices.
• Textbook rentals are on the rise, showing an increase from 8 percent last year to 11 percent this year. Meanwhile, acquisition from Amazon.com rose from 25 to 31 percent, while on-campus bookstores fell from 52 to 46 percent.

In addition to the PDF Survey Report, data from Student Attitudes is available as a dynamic online data set via Real-Time Reporting: a web-based tool which displays raw data – drillable, sortable, and accessible whenever you want it.

Click here to purchase now.

MediaWeek (Vol 4, No 47): Lobbying for On Line Learning, Loan Bubble + More

A long article on how government lobbying activities have brought about significant changes in the prospects for online learning companies (Nation):

Despite the clear conflict of interest between her lobbying clients and her philanthropic goals, Levesque and her team have led a quiet but astonishing national transformation. Lobbyists like Levesque have made 2011 the year of virtual education reform, at last achieving sweeping legislative success by combining the financial firepower of their corporate clients with the seeming legitimacy of privatization-minded school-reform think tanks and foundations. Thanks to this synergistic pairing, policies designed to boost the bottom lines of education-technology companies are cast as mere attempts to improve education through technological enhancements, prompting little public debate or opposition. In addition to Florida, twelve states have expanded virtual school programs or online course requirements this year. This legislative juggernaut has coincided with a gold rush of investors clamoring to get a piece of the K-12 education market. It’s big business, and getting bigger: One study estimated that revenues from the K-12 online learning industry will grow by 43 percent between 2010 and 2015, with revenues reaching $24.4 billion.

In Florida, only fourteen months after Crist handed a major victory to teachers unions, a new governor, Rick Scott, signed a radical bill that could have the effect of replacing hundreds of teachers with computer avatars. Scott, a favorite of the Tea Party, appointed Levesque as one of his education advisers. His education law expanded the Florida Virtual School to grades K-5, authorized the spending of public funds on new for-profit virtual schools and created a requirement that all high school students take at least one online course before graduation.

“I’ve never seen it like this in ten years,” remarked Ron Packard, CEO of virtual education powerhouse K12 Inc., on a conference call in February. “It’s almost like someone flipped a switch overnight and so many states now are considering either allowing us to open private virtual schools” or lifting the cap on the number of students who can use vouchers to attend K12 Inc.’s schools. Listening to a K12 Inc. investor call, one could mistake it for a presidential campaign strategy session, as excited analysts read down a list of states and predict future victories.

And somewhat related: Is there a bubble in student education costs? ( New Yorker):

The bubble analogy does work in one respect: education costs, and student debt, are rising at what seem like unsustainable rates. But this isn’t the result of collective delusion. Instead, it stems from the peculiar economics of education, which have a lot in common with the economics of health care, another industry with a huge cost problem. (Indeed, in recent decades the cost of both college education and health care has risen sharply in most developed countries, not just the U.S.) Both industries suffer from an ailment called Baumol’s cost disease, which was diagnosed by the economist William Baumol, back in the sixties. Baumol recognized that some sectors of the economy, like manufacturing, have rising productivity—they regularly produce more with less, which leads to higher wages and rising living standards. But other sectors, like education, have a harder time increasing productivity. Ford, after all, can make more cars with fewer workers and in less time than it did in 1980. But the average student-teacher ratio in college is sixteen to one, just about what it was thirty years ago. In other words, teachers today aren’t any more productive than they were in 1980. The problem is that colleges can’t pay 1980 salaries, and the only way they can pay 2011 salaries is by raising prices. And the Baumol problem is exacerbated by the arms-race problem: colleges compete to lure students by investing in expensive things, like high-profile faculty members, fancy facilities, and a low student-to-teacher ratio.

From the twitter:

Anthony Burgess archive reveals vast body of previously unseen work Guardian

Hilary Mantel novel Wolf Hall will be part of a trilogy  Telegraph

Nora Roberts: The woman who rewrote the rules of romantic fiction Guardian

Reed Elsevier fails to impress analysts despite revenue growth Reuters

BISG E-Book Consumer Study & Student eBook Usage

BISG released the next edition of their consumer study yesterday and among the findings they reported:

• Power Buyers are spending more. More than 46% of those who say they acquire e-books at least weekly (considered “Power Buyers” in this survey) report that they have increased their dollars spent for books in all formats, compared with 30.4% of all survey respondents. This statistic is important because Power Buyers have proven to be a bellwether of overall consumer behavior by three to six months. 
• Amazon momentum continues. Amazon.com continues to be the preferred source for e-book acquisition (holding steady at 70%) and e-book information (44%). Barnes & Noble comes in second at 26%, with Apple in third. One to watch: libraries, which are on the upswing as a preferred source for e-book acquisition. 
• Satisfaction with e-reading devices is high. Seventy-five percent (75%) of respondents reported they are satisfied with their e-reading device, including more than 38% of respondents who reported being “very satisfied.” Less than 5% said they felt their e-reading device was not a good value for the money. 
• Many barriers to e-book reading are falling. Survey results indicate that concerns about e-book availability are diminishing. And although the cost of e-reading devices remains a reported concern, the single most popular answer to the question of what hinders respondents from reading more e-books was “nothing” at 33% (up from 17.6% a year ago).

The full press release is located HERE

Interestingly, eBrary (which has the same corporate owner as Bowker the BISG partner) also released some findings from their global student eBook survey last week in advance of the Charleston conference: There findings we summarized in a press release:

Key findings of the survey of more than 6,500 students include the following: 

• E-book usage and awareness have not increased significantly in 2011 over 2008 

• Preference for printed books over electronic books has not changed: Both are still equally 
important 

• The vast majority of students would choose electronic over print if it were available and if better tools along with fewer restrictions were offered

• There is a need for reliable social media tools geared toward research 

“These survey results suggest digital content and services providers need to re-think our approach: Until more electronic content is available simultaneously with print, we cannot lose sight of the value of printed books to end-users, who expect to find the most authoritative information at the point of need. To accomplish this we need better integration and tools to increase the availability and discoverability of all types of information, both electronic and print,” said Kevin Sayar, President and General Manager of ebrary. “We do not take data points from this survey lightly, and we thank the library community for working with us to gather important knowledge that will help shape the future of the information industry.”