Episode 46
Course Expenses Deter Student Success with Julia Seaman, PhD
Sarah Holtan, PhD explores the hidden impact of course material expenses on student success with Julia Seaman, PhD, Director of Research, Bay View Analytics. Discover startling statistics and explore surprising insights into how these costs shape students’ academic journeys and choices.
Course materials often play an invisible yet powerful role in higher education. Dr. Seaman’s research shows that these costs can drastically influence students’ ability to succeed academically, sometimes even affecting their choice of majors and institutions. It’s a pressing issue that universities can no longer ignore.
Wondering how rising course material costs are shaping the landscape of higher education and what can be done about it? Listen in as Dr. Julia Seaman shares her findings and discusses potential strategies to alleviate these burdens on students and academic institutions.
Episode Highlights:
03:39 - This question was asking students in their academic career, has the cost of required course materials caused you to do any of those following activities that you've listed? And so it was absolutely surprising to us–dismaying that we do see that there's this really large proportion of students nationally, and we've also confirmed this through state level surveys as well, that students are saying that they are actively impacted by course materials, and so they are taking fewer courses is the most common response. So they are not registering for specific courses.
10:17 - I think one thing that's becoming more of an issue now is that course materials aren't necessarily just the textbook, and that is true, with these digital, course packs they're coming out where even if a student can find their textbook in another means, they still end up having to purchase the digital course pack because that's the only way they can access the homework.
21:28 - Does financial aid cover course material costs? And that's not necessarily true for every student. So a lot of students get financial aid, but financial aid often is mostly just for tuition. Sometimes, it covers other things. And often, even if it does help with course materials, we found from the survey, it doesn't cover the full cost of course materials. And a lot of the times, it may not cover add-on materials, the lab fees, the printing fees, and other things that come in, not just the bookstore purchases of textbooks.
Sarah Holtan, PhD
Julia Seaman, PhD
