BILL ANALYSIS Ó
SENATE COMMITTEE ON EDUCATION
Alan Lowenthal, Chair
2011-2012 Regular Session
BILL NO: SB 1328
AUTHOR: De Leon
INTRODUCED: February 23, 2012
FISCAL COMM: Yes HEARING DATE: April 11, 2012
URGENCY: No CONSULTANT: Lynn Lorber
SUBJECT : Postsecondary education: textbook information.
SUMMARY
This bill requires a publisher that supplies textbooks or
other instructional material to a postsecondary institution
or faculty to provide specific information about that
textbook or material using a standard XML or
comma-delimited format, or both, and requires publishers to
submit the data to the Multimedia Educational Resource for
Learning and Online Teaching program.
BACKGROUND
The federal Higher Education Opportunity Act (HEOA)
requires publishers (when providing information to faculty
or others who select course materials at an institution of
higher education receiving federal financial assistance) to
include in writing:
1) The price at which the publisher would make the
textbook or supplemental material available to the
campus bookstore and, if available, the price at which
the material is available to the public.
2) The copyright dates of the three previous editions.
3) A description of the substantial content revisions
made between the current edition and the previous
edition.
4) Whether the textbook or supplemental material is
available in any other format, including paperback and
unbound.
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The federal HEOA requires each institution of higher
education to:
1) Disclose in the institution's Internet course
schedule, for each course listed, the International
Standard Book Number (ISBN) and retail price of
required and recommended college textbooks and
supplemental materials.
2) Make available to a college bookstore the most
accurate information available regarding the course
schedule and for each course offered the ISBN, retail
price, number of students enrolled in the course, and
the maximum student enrollment for the course.
(United States Code, Title 20, Chapter 28, Section
1015(b))
The College Textbook Transparency Act requires, beginning
January 1, 2010:
1) Textbook publishers to print on the cover or within
each textbook a summary of the substantive content
differences between the new and prior editions, and
the copyright date of the previous edition.
2) Each campus bookstore at any public college or
university to post in its store or on its website a
disclosure of its retail pricing policy on new and
used textbooks.
3) Each public college or university to encourage
personnel responsible for selecting course materials
(typically faculty) to place their orders with
sufficient lead time to enable the bookstore to
confirm the availability of the requested materials.
(Education Code § 66406.7)
Current law requires:
1) The CSU and CCC, and encourages the UC, to work with
the academic senates of each segment to encourage
faculty to give consideration to the least costly
practices in assigning textbooks and to work with
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publishers and college bookstores.
2) College bookstores to work with the academic senates
of each campus to review the process and timelines
involved in ordering and stocking textbooks and to
create bundles and packages of instructional materials
that are economically sound.
3) Urges textbook publishers to provide specific
information to faculty and post that information on
the company's website, give preference to supplements
rather than producing a new edition and disclose the
length of time the current edition is intended to be
in production. (EC § 66406)
The Multimedia Educational Resource for Learning and Online
Teaching (MERLOT) is administered by the California State
University. MERLOT is a web-based tool that houses peer
reviewed online teaching and learning materials, where
faculty share advice and expertise about the posted
materials. Materials are submitted by faculty and other
academics or experts in various content areas. Textbook
publishers do not submit materials for inclusion in MERLOT.
Extensible Markup Language (XML) was designed to transport
and store data (with a focus on what data is), while
Hypertext Markup Language (HTML) was designed to display
data (focus on how data looks).
Comma-delimited data uses a format in which each piece of
data is separated by a comma. This format is generally
used to transfer data from one application to another (most
database systems are able to import and export
comma-delimited data).
ANALYSIS
This bill requires textbook publishers to provide specific
information about that textbook or material using a
standard XML or comma-delimited format, or both, and
requires publishers to submit the data to the Multimedia
Educational Resource for Learning and Online Teaching
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program. Specifically, this bill:
1) Requires a publisher that supplies textbooks or other
instructional materials to a postsecondary institution
or a faculty member of a postsecondary institution to
provide the following information about that textbook
or item of instructional material using a standard XML
or comma-delimited format, or both, in the order
listed below:
a) Book title.
b) Author.
c) Publisher.
d) ISBN.
e) Retail price.
f) Edition.
g) Copyright date.
2) Requires a publisher to submit the data to the
Multimedia Educational Resource for Learning and
Online Teaching (MERLOT) program of the California
State University.
3) Requires this data to be available for public review
and use.
4) Defines:
a) "Comma-delimited" as a type of data format
in which each piece of
data is separated by a comma.
b) "ISBN" as the International Standard Book
Number, a numeric
commercial book identifier.
c) "Postsecondary institution" as both private
and public
postsecondary institutions.
d) "XML" as Extensible Markup Language, which
is designed to
transport and store data.
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STAFF COMMENTS
1) Need for the bill . The Higher Education Opportunity
Act authorizes new programs that support faculty in
selecting quality and affordable course materials for
students by requiring textbook publishers to provide
specific information about textbooks and other
instructional materials. According to the author,
"Given the limited implementation of these policies
this bill takes a proactive approach at providing
textbook price transparency by ensuring that valuable
data, already being provided under requirement of
federal law, to be submitted, collected, and organized
in a useful and uniform format that will ultimately
achieve the intended goal of greater transparency and
consequently greater affordability or postsecondary
content. SB 1328 provides faulty with a usable online
dataset and platform that can compare prices of all
relevant textbooks in one place so that they can make
an educated choice on behalf of students."
2) All data in one place . Current law requires textbook
publishers to provide to faculty and institutions
certain information about textbooks and other
instructional materials. Current law also requires
postsecondary educational institutions and college
bookstores to post certain information about
textbooks. As a result, each campus houses the
information (in course catalog and at bookstore).
There is no requirement that this information be
provided in any particular format, nor is there a
requirement that the information be stored in any
particular way (such as in a searchable database).
This bill requires information about textbooks to be
provided in a format that allows for comparisons with
other materials in the database, as well as house the
data in one shop to allow access and comparisons
across campuses and segments of higher education.
3) Housing the data . This bill requires textbook
publishers to submit specific data to the Multimedia
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Educational Resource for Learning and Online Teaching
(MERLOT) program. MERLOT is a web-based tool that
houses peer reviewed online teaching and learning
materials, where faculty share advice and expertise
about the posted materials. Materials are submitted
by faculty and other academics or experts in various
content areas. Publishers do not contribute materials
for inclusion in MERLOT.
This bill relates to specific data about textbooks, rather
than the content of the textbooks. It may be more
appropriate to house data about textbooks in a system
such as CSU's Affordable Learning Solutions, which is
a web-based system that houses MERLOT as well as other
online tools.
4) Minimal duplication . Current law requires publishers
to provide to faculty and institutions the price and
copyright date of materials, among other information.
Institutions are currently required to include the
ISBN and textbook prices in the course catalog, and
college bookstores are required to post in the
bookstore or on its website the price policy. This
bill requires publishers to provide some of that same
information to the MERLOT program. Publishers,
institutions and bookstores would continue to provide
information about textbooks pursuant to current law.
5) Fiscal impact . The entity that houses the data (CSU
as currently drafted) will likely incur costs to
develop or adapt, and maintain, an online tool to
collect the textbook data and provide a searchable
database.
6) Federal report due in 2013 . The federal Higher
Education Opportunity Act requires the Comptroller
General of the United States to report, by July 1,
2013, on the implementation of the requirements
imposed upon institutions of higher education, college
bookstores and publishers, and particularly examine:
a) The availability of college textbook
information on course schedules.
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b) The provision of pricing information to
faculty by publishers.
c) The use of bundled and unbundled material.
d) The implementation of the HEOA by
institutions of higher education, including the
costs and benefits to such institutions and to
students.
7) Technical amendments needed . Staff recommends
amendments to clarify "postsecondary institutions" are
"postsecondary educational institutions" and to
capitalize "XML."
8) Related legislation . SB 1053 (Steinberg) establishes
the California Open Source Digital Library for the
purpose of housing open source materials. SB 1053 is
scheduled to be heard by this Committee on April 11,
2012.
SUPPORT
None on file.
OPPOSITION
None on file.