Eric Malm, assistant professor of economics and business administration at Cabrini College says, "I love using these books in my Micro and Macroeconomics class. The authors have made the difficult concepts easy for students to understand by using examples and applications. Customizability and accessibility are important to me. Flat World Knowledge offers this book in a customizable Make It Your Own (MIYO) platform that provides the flexibility to add, delete or reorder the content to my preference. I like that students can view the book online, and buy an e-textbook for a very reasonable price."
Brian Evans, an Economics instructor at Foothill College in Los Altos Hills, CA, has adopted these texts for his courses. Mr. Evans did a cost comparison between traditional and online versions of these textbooks. He found that on average, students using traditional textbooks spent $87.63 as compared to $24.76 for an online textbook. This translates to a savings of $2,515 for a single class of 40 students, $10,060 for a single quarter of four such classes and exceeds $35,000 for one year (three quarters + summer).
Economics is one of the most popular classes in community colleges, making those classes more affordable for tens of thousands of students. Instructors can customize and create versions of the books to suit the local economy and the needs and interests of their students. This proves that the open textbook model is not only beneficial in terms of saving students money, but that for an extremely affordable price, students have access to the most up-to-date material that's customized to meet their needs.
