Online Textbooks the Solution to Educational Budget Cuts in California…?
It seems California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger’s answer to the states $24.3 billion deficit and significant educational budget cuts lies in technology! Instead of raising taxes to pay for the $350 Million in new textbooks for California State Schools, Arnold is looking to move to online textbooks, which costs a fraction of a printed textbook.
Moving to electronic textbooks in PDF format solves a lot of problems, like being cheaper and there are no version issues. But what about protecting the publishers from textbooks being shared without authorization or copyright issues. A PDF can be easily forwarded, what is stopping a school from buying one copy of a textbook and copying it for each student?
Do you think electronic textbooks in PDF format is the answer?
