College is getting harder and harder nowadays and it’s not getting cheaper and cheaper, though. Students are struggling now more than ever to complete their studies just so that they could live with a degree or a diploma. This is because our society sort of sets a certain path of how people should live. That path is, go to school go to college, get a job and start a family. Moreover, our society is very judgemental of those who do not live this default life.
The current generation that is taking up a majority of our society is young people who are very bold and are tired of repeating the pattern from their families. As a backlash, some older family members would say “why are you not living our way?” and would not support that kind of living. Nonetheless, a lot of our younger generation now are brave enough to do almost anything. I’ve seen people who are teenagers make money so that they could move out of their house to stay away from judgemental family members. They would work so hard and show people that they could make it on their own.
On the other side of the table is that people choose to not go to college because of how expensive fees are. Not everyone has the privilege of their families paying for everything or the privilege of receiving scholarships which are harder to receive nowadays too. Thus, it is hard. It’s hard to go to college and to get a diploma or a degree. Give time and support to those who are trying their best instead of pressuring or discouraging them further.
Speaking of financial state and effort, here are a few reasons why college students prefer e-books over traditional textbooks:
Save Money
Buying traditional textbooks, especially college ones, are very expensive unless you get a hold of secondhand ones. It would not really be much of a problem if there were actually a lot of students willing to sell their used books. In reality, there are not a lot of people who want to let go of their previously used textbooks. Especially the kind of students that jot down notes in their books. They would want to keep them, either for future references or simply for the memories of them while they were studying. Yes, some people value that. Nonetheless, the point is that secondhand books are hard to get a hold of and new textbooks can cost maybe hundreds. Thus, that is why I think a lot of students would prefer e-books. It would be easier to access and cheaper since they would not need a physically printed one which would cost more. Plus, with recent technology, it is even possible to jot down notes on your devices. Moreover, printing thousands of textbooks is just a lot of work and cost a lot of money too, that’s why printed textbooks are more expensive.
Save The Earth
As we all know, books need to be printed by cutting trees down. With the continuous cutting down of trees, our planet is slowly experiencing global warming. The cutting of trees increases the release of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere which contributes to the thinning of our ozone layer, in turn, causes global warming. Global warming henceforth causes the icecaps on our planet to melt and slowly increase the amount of water which would most probably cause most of our land to be underwater in a few years. To reduce the possibility of us being underwater, we should all contribute to decreasing deforestations and switch to eco-friendlier alternatives, like e-books. E-books will help decrease the need to cut down trees and make our planet better. Let’s help universities switch from physical books to e-books to significantly lessen our carbon footprint.
Save Energy
One of the reasons why college textbooks are so expensive is that they are thick. Especially if you study a more complex major like law or science. Since they are thick, imagine having multiple classes in a day and having to bring all your textbooks with you in order to avoid having to go back and forth to your dorm. Of course, your bag would be heavy. If you do not carry a bag, for sure your arm would hurt carrying your books around. Hence, if all your textbooks are in e-book form, you do not have to worry about carrying heavy textbooks with you all the time. Everything would be at the tip of your finger in your device. Save yourself from backaches and cramped arms when you switch to E-books!
Save Space
Following the previous paragraph, switching to e-books would reduce the use of space too! For instance, most dormitories are quite cramped and accommodate more than one person usually. You would already have all your clothes and other necessities organized in there, but thick textbooks would just take up too much space and look like a cluttered space. Why put yourself through all that trouble when you could simply store every e-book you need on your device? With cloud technology nowadays, you also get to keep them stored for quite a while instead of keeping physical books that would be damaged after a couple of years. Yes, physical books get damaged over time. But e-books would not. Need I say more?
Last But Not Least
Students already have it hard so let’s not give them a harder time. Our government needs to start implementing the use of e-books so that it’ll be easier for the students and our planet. Yes, it will be a little hard for us to adjust to e-books at first but it’s worth the try for a better environment and better studying process for students. Plus, we’re humans. We will learn to adapt to a new norm in no time. Similar to how we adapted to using smartphones. E-books are a smart choice for universities, especially when it comes to costs since it costs a lot to produce physical textbooks.