Editorial & Letters The Brown Daily Herald
Page 10 | Thursday, February 25, 2010
l e t t e r to t h e e d i to r
U. providing increased transfer support To the Editor: We were pleased to read your recent editorial about the importance of ongoing support for transfer students at Brown (“Transfixed,” Feb. 19). In the past two years, the College has introduced a number of enhancements to the advising offered to transfer students. Because these changes may not be widely known, we are writing to offer a brief summary for Herald readers. Incoming transfer students now receive two planning guides before they arrive, “Transfer Guide to Brown” and “Planning Your Liberal Education: A Guide for Transfer Students.” On campus, they undergo a three-day orientation program tailored to their needs. Before, during and after their orientation, they receive individual advising with academic deans, faculty members and a network of peer advisors. Sophomore transfers are paired with a Faculty Advising Fellow, who will serve as a supplemental advisor until the student declares a concentration.
Juniors are immediately put in touch with relevant concentration advisors. Peer transfer counselors — Brown students who were once transfers themselves — help to mediate these advising relationships, sharing their perspectives on Brown and on adapting to a new environment. Beyond the orientation, transfer students also enjoy a number of activities that take place throughout the semester. The Brown community has been enriched year after year by the quality, commitment and zeal of its transfer students. We recognize that an increase in transfer enrollment may present additional advising pressures on the College, but we feel certain that the new programs described here should help us to support all new transfers in the way they deserve. Dean Maitrayee Bhattacharyya ’91 Dean Besenia Rodriguez ’00 Office of the Dean of the College
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e d i to r i a l
Book it In recent years, an increasing number of universities have been making electronic textbooks available as an alternative to traditional print books. The Herald reported last year that universities across the country, including the University System of Ohio, have begun to offer students the option to switch from paper textbooks to electronic versions. In addition to the obvious cost savings and environmental benefits, electronic textbooks make it possible to incorporate extra media content into existing books. Macmillan Publishers is taking advantage of this potential by launching a system in August that will allow professors to personalize electronic versions of existing textbooks. The system, called DynamicBooks, allows professors to rewrite portions of the text, add or delete chapters and incorporate videos and problem sets directly into the book. Macmillan joins the ranks of several other publishing companies that have launched electronic textbook platforms with interactive features. To attract new users, Macmillan will offer professors a $1 per e-book royalty from sales of books that include their customizations. In addition, editors will review online texts every six months and integrate what they consider to be the best revisions into the official version of the textbook. “Dynamic” textbooks are a novel solution to a familiar problem — the difficulty of selecting books that effectively fit a course. Students frequently pay hundreds of dollars for a textbook only to find that it is underutilized in class. Giving professors the power to edit textbooks to suit their needs will allow them to create editions that are more relevant and useful for students. It will also help students bypass the usual uncertainty about which edition of the text to buy.
Although DynamicBooks would seem to be an overwhelmingly positive development, it is not entirely free from controversy. A recent article in the Chronicle of Higher Education cited worries that paying professors for their updates amounts to a kind of “kickback” to lure professors into using the system. These worries strike us as completely unfounded. Professors deserve to be compensated if they put in the effort to update the book, and one dollar per book is unlikely to be an overwhelming incentive for professors to embrace the system. Even in the largest lecture classes, a professor would make no more than a few hundred dollars. Professors already stand to gain even more in royalties by assigning the print editions of their own books to large classes. Additionally, to qualify for the payment, revisions must meet a set of criteria established by the publishers, so only professors that make significant contributions to the textbook would receive money. If DynamicBooks develops into a reliable, easy-to-use system, we wouldn’t have any problem with professors being given even more of an incentive to use it. Professors at Brown should start exploring these innovative new options. A recent Herald story pointed out that electronic books have been slow to catch on at the University. Nevertheless, we still believe that electronic books have the potential to make texts more useful and accessible, especially now that professors can edit the books themselves. In the coming years, we hope to see professors use this new system and others like it to make the books they assign more relevant to the courses they teach. Editorials are written by The Herald’s editorial page board. Send comments to editorials@browndailyherald.com.
correction An article in Wednesday’s Herald (“Recent grads seriously injured in hit-and-run,” Feb. 23) stated that Vice President of Public Affairs and University Relations Marisa Quinn wrote in an e-mail to The Herald that a community-wide message was not sent after Sunday’s accident due to “a number of factors, including issues of safety and security; rights, rules and regulations with regard to privacy; the availability of facts; and the interests of students and family members.” In fact, Quinn wrote that these are examples of factors considered when evaluating whether to send a community-wide message. Quinn did not write that these factors all applied in the case described in Wednesday’s article. The Herald regrets the error.
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