Asking What Students Spend On Textbooks Is Very Important, But Insufficient

Mike Caulfield responded to my post on data usage to understand college textbook expenditures. The core of my argument is a critique of commonly cited College Board data. That data originating from financial aid offices leads to the conclusion that students on average either spend or budget $1,200 per year with that number rising, while there is more reliable data originating from students showing the number to be half that amount and dropping.

In Mike’s response post yesterday, he generally agreed with the observation but is concerned that “readers of that piece are likely to take away the wrong conclusion from Phil’s figures (even if Phil himself does not)”. There is a risk that people see the lower numbers and conclude the “crisis is overblown”, leading to this observation: