Page 6
The Behrend Beacon
Bargains on
books for
beginners
by Tara Kane
lhr Record (Bergen County. N.J.)
ouch. The required textt)ook for your Intro to Psych
course costs $69.
\\Awry not, oh seekers of a higher education. For the
eb-savvy, the credit-worthy. and the just-plain-resoureeful
among you. there are lower-cost options.
'the university bookstore charges just over $5O for a
used version. But you can do a lot better than that.
The same textbook can he had online through a host of
fee-based auction services for around $4O. And there's even
a Web site that helps you identify someone at your school
with whom to bargain directly, or perhaps arrange a swap.
New William Paterson University student Marianna
Proctor and her mother. Beatrice, were surprised to hear of
cost saving ways to buy the armful of books required of
freshmen at the school. They had just paid $51.75 for a
used version of "t Inderstanding Psychology."
But they had a question. Without the bookstore's handy
required-reading list supplied by the professors, how would
thus have known what txx)ks to get?
All, the marvels of the digital age. Many college book
slows are linked tol'iollett.com, where students with course
numbers can lied the books they need. The site lists the
Ix x ikst ore's prices for new and used books, and offers ship
ping t w extra.
But as the Pnvtors learned. you can do better than the
bookstore. even for used books.
The same uscNi textbook that Marianna bought costs
$36.95 on Amazon.com. Other Web sites -
getcheatthooks.com, ecarnpus.com and directtextbook.com
- also offer used texts for less.
f low? Because them is no middleman. The lxx)kstom
buys its used texts from students, who often will happily
accept any cash oiler. That way, the store makes much of
its Prot it Off the sale of used books.
"Ile online services make their money by charging a
lee. usually between $2 and $5 over the sale price.
The downside to purchasing online is that it requires a
credit card. and shipping fees can be costly. That's why.
last year, college grad Ben Wilson founded
screwthebokstore.com - a free, online book exchange
that matches buyers and sellers from the same school. "It
lets students directly negotiate a price and eliminate the
bix)kstore," said Wilson, 24.
Most campus hi )okstores don't feel the online competi
tion is hurting business. "Them are still plenty of students,
such as Wl'll junior Lauren Marcianiak, who prefer the
okl-hishioned way.
I di in't have a credit card." Miu - ciartiak said. "For me
list easier."
the bookstore is
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College students
when decorating
Aura Wade, left, and Stephanie Conn are shown in their dorm room at the University of
Washington in Seattle on August 8, 2003.
When University of Washington roommates Aura Wade and Stephanie
Conn first saw their Lander Hall dorm room, all the furniture was lined up
along either side, "with no space in the middle at all," said Conn, 19, of
Spokane, Wash.
That changed quickly. Wade raised her bed and Conn fitted hers under
neath in an I, shape. A mini-refrigerator and storage take up the rest of the
area under the bed. The roommates added corner shelves, a small round
table with a crocheted lace cover, throw pillows, Christmas lights around
the window and an area rug.
In the hill, the summer-school students will head to the older-style Haggett
Hall, with its built-in furniture. But their decorations including Moulin
Rouge posters for French major Wade and Marilyn Monroe pictures for fan
Conn will still blare their individual styles and interests.
"1 hate when 1 go in a room and you can't really tell anything about their
personality," said Wade, 18, of Kirkland, Wash.
As students settle into college, they'll he looking for inexpensive, space
saving ways to glam up rooms that are intentionally bland. Every year,
Jean Lee is amazed by how the ClW's neutral, standard rooms become "lively
and interesting" with bright colors and hold patterns. "It's such a night-and
day transformation," said the facilities design manager. "No two rooms
look alike."
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Friday September 12, 2003
by Stephanie Dunnewind
The Seattle Times
rely on creativity
dorm rooms
what you sec is what you get," Gould said. Now schools are moving to
mobile, modular furniture "so students are able to be as creative with the
small space as they can."
Many universities offer some rooms with beds that can be bunked. At the
University of Washington, for example, beds in its three renovated residence
halls (Terry, Lander and McCarty), can be raised to different levels so stu
dents can lift individual beds and place storage or desks underneath. Or some
students hunk both beds and then bring in a loveseat or small futon to fill the
resulting space.
"Students come up with the most creative ideas we wouldn't ever think of
ourselves.' Lee said.
Gould thinks many students view their rooms more as a "living area" than
simply a bedroom. "It's not just the place where they sleep," he said.
Students laugh at some of the typical decorating advice offered by adults,
such as "transforming" a room through paint (absolutely not allowed) or talk
ing with a roommate to coordinate bedspreads. Cara Carrubba, a UW junior
who shared a Haggett I lall room her freshman year and now has a single
room in I lansee !tall, said she's never seen matching bedspreads and thinks a
"color scheme" is probably overstating most students' design intentions.
Still, finding balance with a stranger _ or even a friend _ can -be difficult.
"I've seen one situation where they taped a line down the middle of the room,"
Carrubba said. "They were best friends but they knew they were so different
in style."
Wade and Conn made sure they didn't duplicate refrigerators or TVs but
didn't worry about clashing bedspreads.
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Rather than just move everything from
their home bedroom to school, experts ad
vise students to carefully select items to fit
into accommodations that are likely much
smaller -- and probably shared.
"Most people bring way too much stuff,"
said UW resident adviser Katie Handy. "You
don't need to bring every pair of shoes you
Indeed, it's not that students bring too
much in terms of a variety of stuff, but too
many of the same items such as more books,
pictures and clothes than they really need,
said Bryan Gould, assistant director of resi
dence life and housing at Seattle University.
At the University of Washington, residence
hall rooms range from 115 to 186 square feet
for a shared room. Some universities even
hunk three students to a room. Even so, "it's
amazing the things that get packed into a
room." Lee said. "Every year, students try to
get in more and more."
Universities try to accommodate students'
desire for personalized use of space. "Tradi
tionally, most furniture was bolted to the floor
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