Free textbooks for freshers

The days of dog-eared textbooks arriving from Amazon marketplace may soon be a thing of the past, with the first ‘#TextbookRescue’ event in Freshers’ Week.

Hundreds of first year students turned up to the giveaway at libraries across campus on the morning of Wednesday September 18 to grab free books for their courses.

‘#TextbookRescue’ is based on an idea submitted to the Eureka! Library Innovation Challenge by a student at the University, who wanted to leave old textbooks behind instead of taking them home when they graduated.

More than a thousand ‘high quality’ textbooks were donated by generous graduates to drop-off points in University libraries over the summer.

The scheme has been lauded by library staff as a “great success”.

Lisa Donnelly, Market Research and Marketing Officer, said “all of us here at the Library are really happy to have had the opportunity to complete such an exciting project driven by students, for students.

“We hope to continue Textbook Rescue and develop even more student-led innovation in the years to come”.

The event also proved successful at further integrating the library into Welcome Week events.

““It feels like the library is much more a part of welcome week than in past years”, said Esther Miller, Library Customer Services Co-ordinator. “The academic staff have also been impressed with the scheme.”

Gary Penrice, Customer Services Co-ordinator, said, “It’s been a real success here – attracting lots of people into the library so that we can say hello and introduce ourselves.”

The scheme will return in time for Welcome Week next year, with the organisers hoping to make the event “even bigger and better”.