Buying books- necessary?

[aaaslp]

I'm starting my program three weeks from today and have begun looking into the required textbooks for each course.

Each one, bought used, is around $100! I understand that they are a good investment but wouldn't it make more sense to invest in them when I am actually making money as an SLP? I am mainly concerned that they will be needed as reference for my clinical placements, to which I would not have if I rented them. 

Thoughts? TIA!

[MH13]

Several of us are renting our books and if we used it a lot or feel it was a good resource then we will purchase the boom for reference. It’s a total crapshoot to be honest. I still have my undergraduate books and haven’t cracked them since ‘13. ??‍♀️

[aaaslp]

On 8/5/2019 at 5:12 PM, MH13 said:

Several of us are renting our books and if we used it a lot or feel it was a good resource then we will purchase the boom for reference. It’s a total crapshoot to be honest. I still have my undergraduate books and haven’t cracked them since ‘13. ??‍♀️

Thanks for the reply! When you say "some of us", are you referring to your cohort in a graduate program? Thanks!

[14SLP14]

I also was thinking about this! I barely used my books freshman year in undergrad so I just never bought them after that and was completely fine! I wonder if I would be able to get away with not buying them in grad school as well or if it's actually necessary now.

I did take a graduate level course in my undergrad and did not read the required book so I wonder if it varies course to course or by instructor? Or if we just dont need them!

[MH13]

20 hours ago, aaaslp said:

Thanks for the reply! When you say "some of us", are you referring to your cohort in a graduate program? Thanks!

Yes! Several of us in my cohort are renting and will buy if we feel it was a good resource. I will say, never cracked the cultural and linguistic diversity book, barely opened and read part of 2 chapters in speech sound disorders and read 1 chapter in my diagnostics class. It really depends on the professor I think. 

[bibliophile222]

11 hours ago, MH13 said:

It really depends on the professor I think. 

Yup. Some professors say everything in the lecture that's in the reading and never refer to the reading on tests, and some professors will have test questions that you can only get from the readings. On one test, we were asked to give the initials of a patient in a case study in an article we read. I hadn't written in my notes because I didn't think it was important, and I'm still kind of annoyed about it!

[MH13]

10 hours ago, bibliophile222 said:

Yup. Some professors say everything in the lecture that's in the reading and never refer to the reading on tests, and some professors will have test questions that you can only get from the readings. On one test, we were asked to give the initials of a patient in a case study in an article we read. I hadn't written in my notes because I didn't think it was important, and I'm still kind of annoyed about it!

Oh I would be annoyed about that too!!! That’s one of those tricky questions that doesn’t make a hill of beans when it comes time for the praxis. I loathe those questions!!! 

[josiemg]

The first thing I do each semester is to look online to see if I can find a pdf copy of the book! I would also check with different facebook groups as some people have pdf copies that they are willing to email to you for free, or have physical copies of books that they are wiling to see you for less. Make sure you know the return date to get all of your money back if you return a book. If push comes to shove, buy all of your books, and then look at you syllabi as soon as it is available to see if the book will actually be used, if not, return the book and get your money back.

[AlwaysaFalcon]

Personally what I do is rent the books first from amazon or chegg or see if it is cheaper to buy off amazon. I can't afford to buy my textbooks and keep a copy of the syllabus with the textbook name in it in case later on I want to buy the textbook when I have more money haha

[speech97]

I am about to start my first semester so I am not sure if this website will work but I did find a lot of my speech textbooks for undergrad (and every other subject for that matter) on this: b-ok.org. It's free, you just need to download the book onto your laptop. Hopefully it has the books you're looking for on it- worth a try! Good luck! 

Also slugbooks.com compares prices of major sites like chegg, amazon, textbook rentals, etc, and shows you the cheapest place to buy or rent your books from. 

Edited August 25, 2019 by speech97