First Day Complete program left students without books for the first week of class
Students and professors alike have been facing issues with the new First Day Complete program. These issues range from students not getting books, or there not being enough supply, to troubles with communication between professors and students with online course materials.
An entire graduate class didn’t get their books this semester, though they were compensated with bookstore gift cards as an apology. Similarly, there was another incident where the course material was an older edition book and it was very hard to get a supply of that specific edition, though Barnes & Noble reportedly notified the professor beforehand. Professors and students are both still trying to get a grip on the electronic materials causing confusion.
The First Day Complete Program sponsored by Barnes & Noble is a relatively new addition to Truman State University that started last semester. With this program, students pay a flat fee per credit hour and all of their books are included. The first semester with it was slightly rocky, as one would expect when implementing something entirely new. Students were having trouble getting authorized to get their books, some were unknowingly in the program due to not opting out in time and for some students the program went smoothly. This semester there have been fewer issues, and although they are still present, there isn’t an overall systematic issue.
Vice President of Student Engagement and Marketing Tyana Lange is in control of sending out emails on the topic of the First Day Complete Program, so students often receive many emails from her leading up to the new semester, especially if they have neither opted in or out of the program.
“I know that change is hard for people and that it’s always difficult to adjust to something new,” Lange said. “But the reality is this is a really good option to save money, and that’s really what it’s about for me is how can we make sure that our students have what they need to be successful when they need it and this is a good option for them. And if it’s not a good option, then you don’t have to do it and you can opt out.”
The decision to switch from the previous program, Follete, wasn’t all of a sudden. In fact, the university didn’t have much control over the choice to change, besides who they thought was the best option.
The University as a state institution is required to do a request for a proposal between every five to 10 years, and it was time for the bookstore to go up for bid. Initially, there were two to three contractors who bid on the bookstore, though most of them were online. In these bids, Barnes & Noble was the best option, and with that contract was the First Day Complete Program.
“We would have preferred that the process be that you opt-in and the default was everybody opt out, but that is not the standard across-the-board for the entire industry, so we were unable to get them to change it, so we’ve come to the conclusion of simply reminding students to opt in or out,” Lange said. “But we wanted to have a brick-and-mortar kind of spirit store on campus, not just an online bookstore. There were several requests for proposal respondents who suggested we could have somebody else do a spirit store and they’ll just do our books, but it would be completely online and they would just send them to us. We as a university didn’t want that, so Barnes & Noble was the best option considering they let us keep our on-campus spirit store.”
For pre-med students and STEM majors whose textbooks are expensive, the program has been helpful. However, it may not be the right choice for everyone. If a student doesn’t have expensive textbooks or has many classes that don’t have materials, then it would be much easier to get their books elsewhere.
When freshman Joshua Herrera was informed that his books were ready for pickup, he was not told that one of his books was out of stock, nor that another one was only available online, which is something he has been struggling with so far.
“I ended up going over to the Discount Textbook store,” Herrera said. “The guy over there had the World Religion book I was unable to get from the bookstore, and he gave it to me for only $6 for the whole semester. Until I went to the discount store, I was unable to do a lot of the required readings for that class, because the Truman bookstore still didn’t have my book in stock despite saying they should get it soon.”
He said he’s grateful that his professor didn’t dock points for not having the book and being unable to do the readings for his class. Herrera also said he was concerned about being uninformed about the cost of the First Day Complete program and being unsure if he was charged for the books he didn’t get.
