Easing the burden on students
New platform allows access to required chapters instead of having to buy textbook
ONE of the biggest costs that a university student has is books.
While the books are only going to be used for one semester, their exorbitant prices sometimes lead to students resorting to photocopying them from libraries.
Now, a local company is coming up with a new and innovative way to ensure publishers don’t lose out, and also, students don’t break the bank to access information.
With E-llumin8, a local start-up that is helping students lower the cost of education by making prescribed reading material cheaper, students are now able to buy a chapter they need instead of buying the book.
Founder Ditiro Rantloane said: “Being able to buy a chapter is our unique selling proposition. It is one thing that makes us different from any other platform out there. When I realised that, even in 2019, students can’t afford to buy textbooks I wondered what was going on.
“In most cases, you find that you need to write an exam or a test and the lecturer tells you what chapters will be covered. Even if you are covering five chapters, you don’t have R1 200 to buy a whole textbook. With my platform, you will be able to gain better access because you can afford to buy a few chapters.”
Other than being able to buy only the chapters they need, after downloading, students are also able to access the study material off-line.
“I had to imagine a student who managed to buy the books and needs to study when they get home but don’t have data. It was important to have an off-line capability,” he said.
Rantloane said when he started the platform, he expected a lot of pushback from the academic publishing industry, but was pleasantly surprised that they embraced the idea.
“I was very impressed and surprised at how open-minded they were. I think it is because the way I am approaching this is that I am not necessarily cannibalising their system. I am just opening up a new market for them.
“With my platform, the students they lost with the high book prices will now be able to buy the chapters at a cheap price, instead of photocopying books.”
Currently, E-llumin8 has an agreement with Juta Books, and they have 10 textbooks for qualifications including Education, Communications, Accounting, Statistics, Auditing and Business. Rantloane is in talks with other academic book publishers to join the platform for the 2020 academic year. The app is available on Android App store at R47.95.
Rantloane said the uptake of the app has been good, but went down a bit in the second semester. “But, when I speak to other publishers, they say the second semester is the slowest because it is a short one. We went public around June, and we have about 350 profiles. I am really looking forward to next year so we can get more books online,” he said.
On why he left his corporate job to start E-llumin8, Rantloane said: “I felt the need to do something I would be passionate about. To do something that I believe will make an impact and also for a selfish reason, leave a legacy. I was in corporate, but it got to the point where it wasn’t fulfilling.”
He said his long-term view was to branch into other genres of books. “We are looking at including other content on the platform. For instance, recipe books, because sometimes you don’t want to buy the whole recipe book. You just want a recipe for this specific dessert, so that is what we are looking at,” Rantloane said.