CHAIRMAN PUTS FORTH ALTERNATIVE

Southeast Missouri State University should phase out its textbook rental system in favor of a system requiring students to purchase the books, maintains the chairman of the university's Textbook Services Task Force.

Albert Hayward, faculty member and task force chairman, recently offered his recommendations in a minority report of the task force.

Hayward's recommendations contrast with those of the rest of the task force members, who have recommended the university retain its textbook rental system, but with some policy changes.

In his report, Hayward calls for abandoning current textbook policies regarding selection and use of textbooks by faculty members.

He said the university should plan for expansion or construction of a "full-service scholarly bookstore" and the eventual phasing out of the textbook rental system.

In the report, Hayward contends the textbook rental system "diminishes the quality of education" by restricting teaching effectiveness, academic freedom and faculty development.

"The present textbook rental system diminishes teaching effectiveness because it imposes on professors the requirement of selecting a lowest common denominator rather than an individually appropriate text," the report says.

Hayward said the present textbook rental system inhibits the hiring of quality faculty.

The rental system, he said, misrepresents the value of books and book ownership in the educational process.

"Rental of textbooks does not strongly reinforce the habit of reading, since little value is exchanged to obtain them, and the borrower thus holds no property interest in them," the report says.

"This estrangement is reinforced under the present system, which tends to treat books as `consumables' or `accessories' rather than as objects of intrinsic value."

The report adds, "The habit of reading nourishes the imagination directly and imparts to it a `moral potency' which is more effective than lectures, drills, library visits, classroom activities or homework assignments of any kind."

Hayward said in the report that by owning books instead of renting them, students could mark and identify passages in those books. "To underline, highlight or make comments in one's own book is to engage in a personal dialogue with the author," he pointed out. "To do so in a borrowed book, however, is to deface it."

The report contends that no university community should be without a scholarly bookstore. "Yet there is no such bookstore in this community, either on campus or off," Hayward said in the report.

He also maintained that the cost of purchasing textbooks each semester can be reduced by students reselling their unwanted textbooks.

The minority report says a "significant portion" of Southeast's faculty are dissatisfied with the textbook rental system and would prefer a purchase system.

The report concludes, "It is our firm conviction that the slight increase in textbook costs that students would bear under a free market purchase system will be more than offset by the short- and long-term educational benefits they will receive, and by the ability of this university to more effectively carry out its public mission."