Dear Teachers College Press:
I’m an awful big fan of your work. I mean a really, really big fan. Of the five or six books on my desk at work right now, three of them are yours. I made arrangements to order another of your titles just before I headed home for the weekend. ((And in searching your catalog as I was writing this piece, I saw several more books that have influenced my career and thinking. Or that I want to read. Soon.)) Paper. Texts. Books.
Here’s the thing – I don’t really do most of my reading on paper anymore. Nor will I be in the foreseeable future. See, I’ve gotten rather used to the idea of having my books with me all the time. All of them, be they in my nook or my iPad or available to me in a moment’s notice via one of a number ((That’s a referral link for Dropbox – you get extra space if you create an account. And so do I. I wonder if that means I’ve just put a commercial into a blog post. Uh oh.)) of cloud services that I employ.
The problem is – you don’t publish books in etext formats. Like, at all. And that’s beginning to get in the way of me wanting to learn from and with your authors. Who are wicked smart people. I mean, seriously, they’re writing the books that today’s teachers, and tomorrow’s, need to be reading. And you’re publishing them in the finest 20th Century style.
But you’re not publishing in formats that they’re likely to pick up. So I’m beginning to find myself in a pickle when it comes to making purchasing decisions.
And, frankly, it’s getting harder and harder for me to carry your titles in my digital world. My bag is so big. Your books are pretty thick. My devices take up lots of space.
I so want to take your texts with me into the digital world that is my library’s future. But I can’t until you start offering them to me in a format that I can use.
So please. Please. Would you consider offering your titles as ebooks? Soon?
Time is short. There’s good stuff in your catalog. Could you work on getting it into the digital reading ecosystem?
Soon?
Respectfully, a reader and a fan,
Bud
I see my children in the future thinking the same thing. Even they are small ( the younger ones anyway ), they will probably read only ebooks instead of going to the library and borrow one. I just hope they won’t forget the books they and I read to them when they were little.
Sadly, I’m with you Bud. I would love to read a Linda Darling-Hammond book I own but the print is too small and I can’t change the font.
PS. Nice seeing you in Orlando as we raced in opposite directions. You were my first familiar face 😉
Bonnie