I'm not completely dissatisfied with the school, and perhaps I love it here. But recently I ran into a problem with the math department hidden requirements that probably are illegal.
My tuition is paid in full, but the first day I showed for my math class a professor told us that we would either have to purchase a brand new book or buy a pass code if we already bought a used book. The reason for it is that the math department requires students to do their homework and quizzes online (book publisher's website), and which are worth in total 10% of the final grade.
The problem is that there is no way to get an "A" in this class unless you do all the homework and quizzes on the book publisher's website. The school does not provide students with the pass key, they have to pay for it and it costs approximately $44.00. The book is also published as "special LaGuardia edition, " so that you can't buy it anywhere other than the book store or publisher's website, and once you use it you cannot resell it because it becomes useless without valid pass code.
To me that seems very suspicious because the book comes from an unknown author/publisher and it doesn't seem to benefit students so I don't know why would someone make a decision to make a requirement to use this particular book. It rather benefits someone in the math department who might be getting a stake from the sale of the book along with the pass code. I'm not a lawyer, but I think that this practice actually violates anti trust laws. Also, before I registered for this course there was no information available that I'd require to pay ~$44.00 in order to get an "A" in the class.
I'm not blaming a professor for this because it is obviously the department's fault.
This is also not the first time I encounter "special LaGuardia edition" books. The first time it was my another math class that I was taking last Summer. The book was also from an unknown publisher/author, and obviously could not be purchased anywhere but the college book store. The professor that taught the class disliked the book himself because it was very confusing for the average students, but there was nothing he could do as this was the math department requirement. I don't see how "special LaGuardia edition" benefits LaGuardia student in this case, but I truly believe that it benefits financially someone in the department.
Don't get me wrong I like this school, but those little irritating things, like someone trying to get their benefit out of the poor students, making me sit here and type these lines in the middle of the night.
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