At the start of every quarter, Seattle Pacific University students flock to the bookstore to get their textbooks. But in the 2023-2024 school year, the system of how to get those books has changed.
Instead of individually purchasing books through the bookstore and having the option to pick and choose which to order, they were automatically opted-in to a new system: Falcon Advantage.
According to the SPU website, the Falcon Advantage program means that students are able to pick up and access their textbooks “without having to place individual orders or pay out of pocket.” For Falcons who were here before the 2023-2024 school year, the new way of getting books is taking some getting used to.
While some students may be struggling to acclimate to the new system, others found the old system just as difficult. Fourth year political science student Alex Christensen expressed his own past difficulties with the previous bookstore system.
“I once ordered used books for a reasonable price,” Christensen said. “Then, before they came in, I got an email saying that my order couldn’t be completed because they ran out of used copies. They then tried to sell me a used copy for even more.” “That was the last time I used the bookstore.”
In lieu of the on-campus bookstore, Christensen turned to Amazon to purchase his textbooks, a move which third-year English student Tani Yoshioka also made.
“I would get my textbooks digitally or secondhand from Amazon,” Yoshioka explained.
This quarter, like all SPU students, Yoshioka was automatically opted into the new textbook program. She chose not to opt-out this quarter, and still described frustration with some aspects of the new system.
“It’s to my understanding that we can’t opt out of classes individually if one is less costly than another […] I wish that we could pick and choose which classes we wanted to use the program for,” Yoshioka said.
According to the Falcon Advantage page, students are charged “a flat fee per student per credit hour, regardless of how much each textbook costs.”
That means students are charged for every class they are in, even if they do not have any required books, something which frustrated Yoshioka.
“I have a class that has no required textbooks, so I’m a little upset about still having to pay that flat rate,” Yoshioka said. “I plan to look more into whether or not I can opt out of it without losing the textbooks I’ve already gotten.”
Despite this criticism, Yoshioka does see some merit in the new program.
“I can see the advantages of the system for people with extremely costly textbooks,” Yoshioka said. ”If my textbooks ever fell into that category, I would be very thankful for the new system.”
Yoshioka summarized her experience with the Falcon Advantage program by expressing a general lack of information about the extent and specifics of how the system worked. She stressed her uncertainty about the cost versus benefits of the program. Going forward, she’s unsure if she’ll stick with it.
Only time will tell how advantageous the Falcon Advantage program will turn out to be.
“Next quarter, I’m planning to examine the cost of my textbooks more closely to determine if I’m actually saving money through the new system,” Yoshioka said.
