Pierre Venescar, Graduate Assistant, Center for Access, Success and Achievement (CASA)

The Affordable Materials Project (AMP) has seasonal initiatives focused on helping students save money on assigned course readings. Last fall we learned that the book matching program delighted students old and new. Some might even say it was Christmas in September. Many first time college students enrolled in the Augustine and Culture Seminar (ACS) were able to read assigned digital edition books at no extra cost. Even master’s level student, Pierre Venescar, was “surprised but content” when he received an email notifying him that two of his graduate textbooks for the fall were available online. “The cost of textbooks can weigh heavily for some students and I feel this is something often ignored. It is refreshing to know that there is a program like AMP that is actively trying to help reduce the cost for students,” said Venescar.

Library elves are hard at work, making lists and checking them twice to hopefully bring joy in January to Villanova students. With the essential help of the the Villanova University Bookstore, Chris Hallberg, Library Technology Developer, matches faculty assigned course readings to ebooks available for library purchase. Some disappointments are always to be expected, and the book matching program is no exception. What we typically recognize as textbooks are rarely available for libraries to license as ebooks. For those that we can, University Information Technologies (UNIT) works it’s magic by placing links to assigned readings in Blackboard for eager students to open, if not on the first day of class, soon thereafter.

For faculty that want to join in the festivities, you may write your librarian to suggest a book for inclusion in the matching program. If for whatever reason a faculty member does not wish a course to partake, they can email Linda Hauck, Business Librarian, or Nik Fogle, Philosophy Librarian, to opt out.