The use of electronics in university and college coursework is proliferating, according to a number of reports released this week. College students can save as much as $60 per title by using e-textbooks, reports digital course materials provider CourseSmart.com; and market researcher Simba Information forecasts e-texts will grow at a CAGR of 48.5 percent by 2013.
Yesterday, an article in The Wall Street Journal reported iPads were being used at some universities as a substitute for textbooks. Widespread use of mobile devices and improved functionality is one for the reasons electronics are catching on quickly at colleges and universities.
It turns out that textbook publishers are making their material easily available in digital format. (I had a question about that in yesterday's blog: The Pros & Cons: Tablets vs. Textbooks.) Individual publisher Websites and e-textbooks providers such as CourseSmart.com offer more than 90 percent of the most popular higher education course materials in use today.
In addition to lower cost, portability, and anytime/anywhere access from any computer or Web-enabled mobile device, e-textbooks offer advanced search functionality, note-taking capabilities, digital highlighting, and the ability to email passages to peers. Students can also purchase their books one chapter at a time on some publishers' Websites, buying just what they need, just when they need it.
According to research by the National Center for Academic Transformation, the latest course technologies, coupled with course redesign, can decrease dropout rates by as much as 34 percent while lowering the colleges and universities' cost per pupil for instruction by 37 percent.
CourseSmart.com developed several free Apps that can be downloaded via iTunes and enable students to access their e-textbooks on an iPad, iPhone, and/or iPod Touch.
E-text does relief the burden of carrying a whole stack of books for students, but taking notes on the fly is nowhere near taking on a real text book. I find having a real textbook is still a better choice.
I can understand the convenience of e-text in place of textbook for classroom. Students no longer have to carry 10lb load in their backpacks. What the drawback is with e-text, is that it is impossible to just write notes on the fly and highlight as students study the materials in great length. If the manufacturer of e-text can make that capability happen, I think that it will be much more user friendly
Of course! But in what way do you see people assisting computers? Adaptation is always a response to a change and a process of evolution. The ones who are not able to adapt are left behind. And this happens in all the spheres of the life that humanity has created, including technology.
I see and understand your point, but mental adaption is one thing, sticking square wheels onto your vehicle just to be fashionable is another matter, computers are here to assist people, not the other way round, once we are on that slippery path it will be difficult to change.
This is one of the major reasons apple has been so sucessful, it is the high level intergration making peoples lives easy that is the source of their success.
Ipod.... music store... I pad... application store, plus the cross-platform integration, related to look and feel, it is consistent across the platforms and into OS X.
If one 'monitor' solutions were possible and mental adaption was possible to the level we are discussing, then there would be no need for more than one monitor on a computer, there would be no need for stock traders to use upward of six monitors at a time.
We have in-fact hit a major bottle neck in both input and output systems, that is limiting a reduction in device size and usability.
The next great innovation will be related to input-output systems, and ultimately it will be industry changing at a fundamental level.
Good point. What about exercising mental adaptation? This is what we need in order to develop the new abilities required to replace the way of using multiple sources (books) you have described.
You can open the same e-book several times in all the different sections/pages you need, it's not hard to "flip" from one section to the other just with a click. You can't do that with a book unless you have several copies of the same book. :)
Texture and fragrance will remain exclusive to books unless or until they develop something like an e-reader/tablet with sensors able to trigger the senses of smell and touch through electromagnetic impulse transforming the information gathered into somatic. Everything the brain knows or reacts to comes to it in only one way: through the senses. <- this is an interesting read by Richard F. Taflinger, PhD.
The biggest problem with E readers is that they cannont be 'spread out' the same way a number of books can be, when studying at higher degree level it is often necessary to utilize multiple sources at the same time, without 'flipping' between pages/ books.
Iv'e spent more than a few nights with a desk full of books all opened at the same time on different pages, working with an e-reader is just too distracting in this sort of environment, since you spend more time managing the material and flipping between sections/ books.
I love technology, but we just are not there yet, perhaps in another decade, when we have 'mental' projection , where the material can be projected into our 'visual' area and no longer limited by the x/y co-ordinates of the interface, then just maybe they will be useful.
We are close really close, but just not there yet.
Difficult to duplicated, indeed. But would there be a reason why an e-reader should duplicate the experience we can have with a book? I believe it's just better to accept the e-reader/tablet as an alternative, a different means of obtaining the same results --or better in the case of the text books Vs. e-books presented here.
And yes, it was quite an experience. That's why I think books will become romantic, something to experience, something to feel or something through which we would be able to recall memories and feelings. That is the future of books.
Interesting point that a book's appeal goes beyond the visual. A related point is that in many higher-end magazines, quite a bit of effort goes into getting the texture and fragrance of the pages just right. Difficult to duplicate this experience with an e-reader.
Barbara nice article, along with the all the advantages of e-text that you explained in your article one more advantage is : "SAVE PAPER". This helps us go green. I think all the colleges should adopt this.
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Thailand Stages a Comeback Join EBN contributor Jennifer Baljko on Thursday August 23, 2012, at 11:00 a.m. EST for a live chat on how electronic manufacturers in Thailand have shored up their supply chain to reduce the impact of future natural disasters.
Euro-Crisis: What It Means for High-Tech Firms Join EBN Editor in Chief Bolaji Ojo and Contributing Editor Jennifer Baljko on Thursday, July 12, at 10:00 a.m. EDT for a Live Chat on high-tech and Europe's economic difficulties.
Microsoft Surface: Potential Winners & Losers What are the implications for the electronics industry supply chain of Microsoft Corp.'s decision to launch its own tablet PC? Join industry veteran and EE Times' systems and OEM expert Rick Merritt on Tuesday, July 3, at 12:00 pm EDT for a Live Chat on this subject.
Join EBN contributor Jennifer Baljko on Thursday August 23, 2012, at 11:00 a.m. EST for a live chat on how electronic manufacturers in Thailand have shored up their supply chain to reduce the impact of future natural disasters.
Peter Drucker famously said "Trying to predict the future is like trying to drive down a country road at night with no lights while looking out the back window." Yet in the razor's-edge world of electronics—with a lean supply chain and just-in-time demands—the need to know the future is vital.
While no one really can accurately predict the future, we can take guidance from another Drucker saying which is the best way to predict the future is to create it.
You've heard the saying "the No. 1 supply chain risk is your people." That hasn't always been the case. But today's complex global supply chain requires a new type of multitalented employee. It's one who understands, finance, marketing, economics, is savvy with technology, graceful with relationships and can think analytically.
Where are these people? Are universities properly preparing the next generation supply chain professionals? How do train your existing workforce for these new, demanding positions?
Brian Fuller, editor-in-chief of EBN, will lead a 60-minute Avnet Velocity panel discussion that will ask and answer these and other questions swirling around today's supply-chain talent challenges.
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