Tag Archives: Amazon Kindle

How it works

Posted by bookgator in Book, Books, College, Discount, Education, School, Student, Textbooks, University |        on , , , , , , , , , , | 17

www.BookGator.com is a social platform where students, instructors, and student interest groups can work together to reduce cost of textbooks and education in general.

So here’s how it works:

In three easy steps you can save tons of money on your textbooks:

Step 1 - Get registered with Bookgator.com with a simple registration process, or use your social network account (Facebook, twitter, Google)

Step 2 - Add textbooks that you are studying in the current term or studied in previous terms and still own in your Bookshelf, and add textbooks that you want for next term in your wish list.

 

Step 3 - Start trading books with your friends, students on campus, or nationwide. Each book you give to another student will credit your account with the full value of the book. You can use this credit to request books in your wish list from other students.

Also, if you don’t want to trade your textbooks for credits, you can still sell your books to students directly from the BookGator Marketplace.

Why Trading?

Today, students have many choices to buy textbooks, however, none of them are economical:

  • New textbooks cost an avg. of $175 (after discount)
  • Used textbooks cost an avg. of $145
  • e-Textbooks cost an avg. of $125 (with no buyback)
  • Rent textbooks cost an avg. of $80 (with no buyback)

The average buyback value of textbooks by online and college bookstores are around 50% of the used textbook’s market price.

So above chart shows that combination of Trading with other options can save you tons of money.

Your social bookstore!

Save money. Save time. Save trees.

We believe that every term textbook shopping should cost < $99 and not take > 9 minutes

Will Technology Replace Textbooks?

Posted by Jules Mariano in Books, Education |        on , , , | 5

With the coming of a new wave of technological innovation in mobile technology, the way people access educational resources such as books has changed. Much of the content that can be seen in books are now readily available on the web and this has forced many book publishers to start publishing books in eTextbook format instead of the usual print.

Mobile gadgets such as the iPad and other similar tablets has replaced the traditional textbooks and serve students with rich multimedia content. Applications which run in tablets and smartphone add features which further enrich the students’ learning experience.

Guilford Technical and Community College, Salem College, Wake Forest University, and Winston Salem State University have recently developed BioBook to Biology 101, a software that served to replace the traditional classroom books like life sciences and allow access to them in popular tablets available in the market today.

There has been a tremendous increase in how the books are used as well as the performance of students who are using them. Because the books are downloaded and stored in mobile gadgets, they are readily available and encourages more students to bring their textbooks in classroom no matter what mobile platforms they are used to using.

An overwhelming positive response was received by the participating universities about the use of the software and how it made learning easy for many students.

Similar educational programs such as the Bookshelf Project paved the way for old textbooks to join the ranks of the newer ones by reintegrating them into the stack of books available for students to read. The project aimed to make textbooks accessible by being able to read them remotely and eliminating the need to print hardbound books thereby saving trees. Also, the problem with having to take heavy books for home use is now eliminated. Thanks to downloadable eTextbook format of these reference books.

iPad, Nooks, Amazon Kindle, and other electronic reading devices are starting to see a promising future for the electronic versions of textbooks. Students now longer have to find textbook, it finds them.

Educational policy makers now understands that students actively participate in the creation and sharing of information as they participate heavily in social networking websites. The schools need to go where the students are to encourage learning and keep the students interested to learn. The Bookshelf Project understands this challenge and so they go where the students are.

The technology is fast replacing the many things we use to see and do in schools. Is this a bad sign or is this novel direction only form part of the natural evolution of education as a whole? Tell us in the by leaving a comment below.