Classes have started for the 2009-2010 school year and the most common question I hear from colleagues or former students when I see them again is, “How was your summer?” My answer is always the same….”Not long enough!”
I have been very lazy about writing anything this summer for the bog; which doesn’t mean that nothing has happened, just that nothing has moved me to get off the chase lounge on my new deck and work. That being said, there were two issues that I needed to address this summer; the new Chemistry text books and student requests concerning placement.
The Chemistry text books we used for the last nine years were a mess and long overdue for replacement. At the end of last year, the department decided on a replacement—the new edition of the book we currently use. The money available from the state of Illinois was enough purchase 349 student books; unfortunately there are 414 Chemistry students registered. The feared drop of 200+ in school enrollment never materialized; there being 3 more students enrolled in Chemistry compared to last year, and, depending on who you talk to, either 15 more students enrolled in school or about 20 less. Either way, enrollment has firmed up and we appear to be on solid ground for the time being.
The school needed to purchase approximately 70 additional books to cover the shortage. We decided to pay for them through the department budget and charge each student an extra $10 on their lab book for the next two years to cover the cost. I contacted the publisher’s rep who sold us the original 349 to get a price for the additional books. She emailed me a proposal for $119/copy, about $10 more than they charged for the state. When I called the order in the customer service rep refused to honor the proposal price, insisting that the books could be sold for no less than $159 each. I emailed the rep and informed her of the problem; telling her that we decided to cancel the order and use the old books for another year because of the cost.
Within two days I got calls from three different people, including the rep, horrified that we would cancel the order which totaled more than $45,000. The rep explained that it was her fault for not sending a copy of the proposal to customer service before I called. I would have gladly paid the $119 that was first agreed to as well as paying for the teacher’s materials—though I did not tell the rep this. After some negotiations, we agreed on a price of $105/book + six free sets of teacher materials worth approximately $300 each. The fortunate mix-up by the publisher saved the school almost $7000.
Next Post: Students placement requests.
