How do you move all your textbooks from home to grad school

[InquilineKea]

Do you pay a lot more money for moving services and such? Especially since it's so hard to take them all on a plane with you?

Honestly, I'm thinking that I'll just screw the process, download all the textbooks i currently have, and get a Kindle DX for them, when time comes.

[jmacnomad]

Do you pay a lot more money for moving services and such? Especially since it's so hard to take them all on a plane with you?

Honestly, I'm thinking that I'll just screw the process, download all the textbooks i currently have, and get a Kindle DX for them, when time comes.

You can ship books via media mail from the post office for fairly cheap. It's cheaper than paying for bags on the plane and much less hassle. You can go on the post office website to see how much it would cost per pound.

Edited March 22, 2011 by jmacnomad

[chaospaladin]

Do you pay a lot more money for moving services and such? Especially since it's so hard to take them all on a plane with you?

Honestly, I'm thinking that I'll just screw the process, download all the textbooks i currently have, and get a Kindle DX for them, when time comes.

You can ask your parents to send it to you.

[neuropsychosocial]

Do you pay a lot more money for moving services and such? Especially since it's so hard to take them all on a plane with you?

I would recommend thinking about which ones you'll actually use. How much of the information is available online? I've realized that when I need to know something from a lower-level class, it's usually easier to just google it, rather than spending the time finding it in the book. There are a couple of classes where the articles on wikipedia are more detailed than my understanding of the material, and I'm keeping my undergrad text because I understand how it presents the material (cognitive neuroscience, I'm looking at you!). I've moved my undergrad texts three times now and I'm selling most of them on amazon before I move again - it's not worth moving the textbooks, for the most part. If you do want to take books with you, media mail is a great way to send books cheaply - maybe $15 for 60 pounds? If you mail them the day before you leave, you'll definitely beat the package there, assuming that you're not walking from Oregon to Florida. The packages needs to be MEDIA only, and if you're sending books, I highly suggest wrapping them in plastic, just in case they encounter some water on the way... although I probably shouldn't have bothered sending an entire box of old National Geographics, anyway.

[rising_star]

Media mail was less than $0.50 per pound, and that was literally going across the USA. They said up to two weeks, but the boxes started getting there 5 days after I shipped them.

Honestly, I shipped a bunch of books across the country via Media Mail that I haven't even looked at in the 2.5 years that I've been here. I've moved them across town a few times and now I'm planning to sell a bunch to the used bookstores here so I don't have to store them during my year of fieldwork. I wish I hadn't moved them out here in many cases.