Online education advances over traditional models
The development of the technology begins to cause significant changes in teaching models. In universities, for example, the traditional crowdedlibraries copies are giving way to digital books (e-books).
This is the case of the Department of Engineering, University of Texas at San Antonio (UTSA) where digital texts can be downloaded from any terminal to the laptops of the students.
In September, the UTSA opened the first library without books that works in a U.S. university campus
It can accommodate 80 people and houses 425 000 18 000 digital books and digital magazine subscriptions, reports the BBC reporter, Kabir Chibber.
Drastic change
"With better search tools and an increasing availability of digital content, find information became more simple," said Krisellen Maloney, dean of the libraries of the UTSA.
Other study centers follow the same trend.
In 2000, the Kansas State University opened an electronic library, but kept some reference books. Earlier this year, Stanford University took away all the copies, except 10 000 printed volumes of his Library of Engineering.
With these new systems, the library staff now has more time to help students with their queries instead of taking books off the shelves.
But academic publishers have slowed digital publications and for one simple reason: academic texts represent a value about $ 8 billion a year in the U.S.
Publishers and booksellers are not willing to kill the goose that lays golden eggs.
"Business models are changing in the publishing world but in some cases there remains a tendency to print," says Maloney.
"The model (traditional) still remains because the publishers are resisting an alternative," says David Prescott, head of sales at Blackwell's one of the largest academic libraries in the UK
Digital books can be shared and copied many times, as opposed to having 30 books for 30 students.