VOICE team financial coordinator Jackie Leung is helping students create an online used book exchange with Castanet. The VOICE team supports student and non-student projects that are relevant to the campus community through use of action research methods.
Exchange will lighten the financial load for undergrads
On every university campus, students commonly worry about finances.
Courtney Hayes and Farah Sarif, fourth-year students at UBC’s Okanagan School of Nursing, came up with a plan to alleviate some of that stress. They have created an alternative for buying and selling textbooks, an option that can save money and perhaps give students one less thing to worry about.
While completing a practicum with the VOICE Study, a research program focused on healthy campus development, the pair determined that many other students shared their concern about textbook costs, and then developed a practical solution with the help of community business partner Castanet.
Currently the UBC Bookstore and the Students’ Union manage a textbook buy-back service for students and then resell the used textbooks in their stores. However, Hayes and Sarif wanted to increase the amount of money remaining in students’ pockets by introducing a third alternative where students manage the buying and selling themselves. They sought out the help of Jackie Leung, a Campus Health staff member and UBC alumna.
Leung was confident the idea would fly.
“When I found out that our students do not have a student-to-student textbook exchange platform, I was shocked,” says Leung, who says she often used several websites to buy and sell textbooks when she was attending UBC’s Vancouver campus.
Castanet, a popular online regional news service with a buy and trade web section, agreed to partner with the students at no cost and to categorize their existing textbook exchange by academic disciplines for easier browsing.
“By using Castanet’s buy/sell textbook section, we hope students will interact with one another and negotiate a fair price that is sufficient for each individual,” says Hayes. Word about the student book exchange is spreading across campus.
For more information about the VOICE Study and opportunities to make a difference on campus, please visit the Health & Wellness website:
- http://www.ubc.ca/okanagan/students/health-wellness/Campus-health.html
- http://www.ubc.ca/okanagan/students/health-wellness/welcome.html
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