The Revenge of the Textbook: Why Ed Tech Enthusiasts Need to Understand Textbook Adoption Policy

Many observers have noted that one of the primary market failures in the educational technology marketplace is that “the buyers are not the users.” That is, while schools or districts are in charge of buying ed-tech for their schools, students and teachers are the ones who actually use the tools. Too often their preferences don’t inform purchasing decisions, leading to a glut ineffective or unused technology products sitting in the backs of classrooms or storage closets.

However, this issue has long existed; many a teacher can tell you of a time he or she left a set of inadequate textbooks on the shelf and instead created his or her own materials. And even as digital tools threaten to render textbooks obsolete, our textbook policies may yet haunt the quality of instructional materials. The parallel difficulties of purchasing technology and textbooks are increasingly being reflected in state formal adoption policies for instructional materials. And as policymakers and analysts think about ways to reform adoption policies to outfit a classroom with a diverse array of digital tools, they would do well to consider how the long arm of textbook adoption has shaped and continues to shape the purchasing decisions of school and district officials.

The primary policy choice that has governed textbook procurement is formal adoption policy. States that use formal adoption decide which textbooks to use in schools at the state level, while the rest of states allow textbook decisions to be made at the local level. Adoption at the state level has been the source of much ire. Because purchasing decisions that occur for such wide swathes of students can dramatically boost sales of any given textbook company, some have argued that textbook makers allow state preferences to trump academic consensus in decisions about what gets included in the text.

According to the Education Commission of the States, as of late 2013, 21 states adopt textbooks at the state level. The degree to which states force districts to use adopted materials in those states can vary; some states give districts no choice, while others offer strong incentives such as state funding, guaranteed curriculum alignment or the lower prices that come with the increased negotiating power of offering a state’s worth of textbook orders. No matter the extent of the adoption policy, though, state influence plays an important role in textbook adoption.

As the future of the textbook remains uncertain amidst the development of digital alternatives, the influence of textbook procurement policy remains uncertain. As the New York Times said of the influence of the Texas Board of Education in 2010, “The board, whose members are elected, has influence beyond Texas because the state is one of the largest buyers of textbooks. In the digital age, however, that influence has diminished as technological advances have made it possible for publishers to tailor books to individual states.” Despite the ostensible possibility for textbook policy to decline in influence as textbooks decline in popularity, many states already have a definition for textbooks or instructional materials sufficiently broad to encompass digital learning tools, and thus are similarly subject to formal adoption rules.

As technology has made it possible for instructional materials to take different forms - from e-textbooks to Khan Academy - the need for states to update their definitions of those materials has increased. Many states include digital tools in their current definitions of instructional materials or textbooks, according to a database of state policies  from the State Education Policy Center (SEPC), a robust source for information on such policies maintained by the State Educational Technology Directors Association. For example, Louisiana defines a textbook as “any medium or material (print or non-print), book, or electronic medium that constitutes the principal source for teaching and learning in a specified subject area.” Similarly, Florida uses the broad category of instructional materials to describe “items having intellectual content that by design serve as a major tool for assisting in the instruction of a subject or course.” As a result, in both states, formal adoption rules apply to digital materials as well.

The structures in place to carry out statewide adoption may present an opportunity to provide schools with guidance on the best digital tools available. As district and school officials have struggled amidst the flood of new educational technology vendors to discern between quality products and inferior ones, many observers have suggested that centralizing the task of determining the best tools would both ease the burden on local officials and produce better choices. One example of such a proposal comes from Bellwether Education, which has suggested creating an “approved model” designation for personalized learning that states or districts could use as a stamp of approval to signal quality to schools looking to adopt such methods.Such a plan could also work for the digital tools that facilitate blended learning themselves.

But even new “approved models” could suffer from the problems of current adoption policies. From non-expert panels to an excessively prescriptive influence on local policy, there seem to be many problems with the design of the groups currently charged with vetting the traditional materials - although there are some signs of reform. Such groups would require an even higher bar of expertise for effectively vetting digital content, but the general structure of using experts to vet materials could prove useful in the world of digital tools, where iteration happens much faster than the development of news textbook or curricula.

If ignored, the current system of adoption could not only easily replicate with digital materials many of the same issues that critics see with textbook procurement, but could also miss opportunities to leverage the design of the current system to create a more efficient market for learning technologies. Even states that don’t currently have adoption policies should be aware of potential pitfalls and advantages of statewide vetting systems for instructional materials, in case their state considers moving toward such a model for digital materials.

Whatever the possible future role of adoption policies, their current design poses important questions for policymakers: Is it prudent for policies designed for print materials to be repurposed for digital learning materials? Can the structures of adoption be more effective for digital tools? How would those structures need to be designed to function optimally? If vetting of materials can occur effectively, would it be best to do at the local, state or federal level and how should we decide who is selected to do the vetting? These questions will increasingly need answers as state leaders recognize the potential of digital textbooks throughout public education.