How does a college decide which books to sell to students?

Are the courted by publishers? Do teachers decide, or does the dean of each college? Are teachers paid to use certain books? Can a teacher opt to use no books and use only their own material?How does a college decide which books to sell to students?
Professors choose a book. After choosing it, the course's sample syllabus has to be approved by a suitable accreditation board (ABET for example) but this doesn't present a problem. If multiple professors teach a single class they'll submit one book on the syllabus usually, sometimes more than one, and put any others as references.



Teachers use their own books because that's why they wrote them - they saw a void in the field and wrote a book to fill it.



Teachers can and do choose not to use textbooks.This is how many textbooks start life - a professor will find no good existing book for a subject and put together note packets of their own material, then refine it over the years and eventually publish it.



Even if a course does have an assigned book professors don't always choose to use it. Professors can also choose to allow older editions of textbooks despite what's listed on the accreditation syllabus.
Professors decide which books to use. the "college" itself has no idea what textbooks would be good for all of their courses.



For instance, how would a dean of engineering know what would be the most useful textbook for a magnetohydrodnamics, earthquake engineering, and signals classes? he/she cannot be an expert in all fields.



Further, the classes you have follow textbooks. They are not forced on professors, they choose which book they think is most useful. Some textbooks that are "required" are references, some professors follow them down to the letter.How does a college decide which books to sell to students?
Hi,



it is the professor/instructor that decides on the texts you need. He/she then places the order with the university bookstores. I have never heard of a teacher that didn't use a textbook, except maybe in literature classes. In that case you normally just buy novels or anthologies of short stories/poems. Teachers do not get paid to use certain books unless they took part in writing it. I have had classes before where the professor urged everyone to buy the more expensive books so they could do "extra credit", and in the end she would get a gratuity for each sale.
teachers will have it in the syllabus the first class and also the give the college bookstore a list of what books they will need for the class so student will pick it up... usually at a college bookstore they will have the books sorted by the class and the subject numbersHow does a college decide which books to sell to students?
If you do an ancient or classical source, it is imperative they have access to a good secondary source. For example, Machiavelli's "The Prince" is considered pivotal, leading to many revolutionary thoughts. But good secondary sources are hard to come by for such a short read:



http://www.ashokkarra.com/2009/07/an-int鈥?/a>
Teachers have a say in what books are used, but it depends on the course. There are lists of approved books that can be used. Usually the books are provided by a third party company to be sold in your College's book store.