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"OpenStax College, the year-old Rice University startup that produces free online textbooks, will more than double the number of fields in which it has titles by 2015, the university announced today. A grant from the Laura and John Arnold Foundation will allow OpenStax College to add to its current offerings in physics and sociology, and its two new biology books and an introductory anatomy text coming out this fall. The new titles will be in precalculus, chemistry, economics, U.S. history, psychology and statistics, Rice said, toward its goal of producing high-quality open-source books in the 25 most-enrolled college courses. OpenStax says its existing two texts have been downloaded more than 70,000 times so far."

Presented by senators Walker Byrd and Justin Mathews, the proposal would provide students with free or inexpensive "open textbooks" through a nonprofit organization, OpenStax, based out of Rice University. "We as students should have purchasing power of the books we buy, but we don't," Byrd said. "The professors require a book and often times you have no control over how much that book is going to be."

Baraniuk said OpenStax College's print edition prices are already exceptionally low - about $30-$54. He said the NACS agreement will allow OpenStax College to lower prices by about 2 percent next year. Beyond the per-copy drop in prices, Baraniuk said the NACS agreement will also save students money by reducing how much OpenStax College has to pay for shipping.