OTC, Text Bucks tangle again

The relationship between the used bookstore and one of the two Springfield universities it depends heavily on for business has been particularly strained since July 2005, when Wampler sued OTC for denying him access to the student directory.

In the suit, Wampler alleged that the school had violated Missouri’s Sunshine Law by refusing to release information about OTC students. Despite an internal nonsolicitation policy prohibiting the release of student information, OTC eventually acquiesced. A bench trial scheduled in August 2006 was averted when the parties settled.

“They haven’t forgot I drug them into court,” Wampler said after OTC officials approached him this semester about selling teacher’s edition books.

But OTC President Hal Higdon, who took the helm in July 2006, said he holds no ill will against Wampler or Text Bucks.

“I believe in water under the bridge,” Higdon said. “As long as we’re all looking out for the best interests of the students, we’ll be in good shape.”

Higdon’s comments come on the heels of a KOLR 10 report in late August that featured two OTC English instructors who were angry with Wampler for selling teacher’s edition textbooks to students. Some of the books had stickers or tape covering words denoting the book’s contents.

Wampler said Text Bucks didn’t deliberately sell the books to students, and he agreed to issue refunds for the editions. He said only four refunds have been issued out of about 5,000 books sold to OTC students for the current semester.

OTC English instructor Kelly Anthony-Gratton said she found 30 copies of teacher’s edition textbooks in her classes the second week of school, but she couldn’t say if they all came from Text Bucks.

“I feel that if the textbook dealers are doing an honest business, they would have no need to cover up the ‘not for resale’ (labels),” Anthony-Gratton said.

Wampler said he apologized for the mistake, removed remaining copies from the shelves and promised to police incoming editions more closely in the future.

“If they have answers in them, I’m not going to sell them,” he said, acknowledging that OTC faculty members may not believe his explanation.

Higdon said he would have reacted similarly had he been in Anthony-Gratton’s shoes.

“If I was an instructor and I walked into my classroom and people had teacher’s editions of the book, I would be very unhappy, and our faculty were,” he said. “I would hope that (Wampler) would never sell teacher’s editions ever. … Any reputable bookstore would never knowingly sell teacher’s editions.”

When asked about the responsibility of students to make ethical decisions when buying books, Higdon suggested that students often make the wrong choice.

“Students have a responsibility, but I guess we were all students at one time,” he said. “A student is a student, and there are some very fine students. There are also students who are always looking for an edge.”

Starting this semester, OTC implemented a policy that requires businesses and political groups to limit their presence on campus to public areas, Higdon said. Wampler believes the policy is aimed at Text Bucks employees who hand out fliers, but Higdon said the policy had more to do with a disruptive political group that “assaulted” students walking to and from campus earlier this year.

Higdon said the policy is not intended to squelch businesses, such as bookstores, restaurants and credit-card companies, that primarily market to students.

“I think (Wampler) has a right to sell and he has a right to market, and I would never want to infringe on that,” Higdon said. “(He has) more than an ample opportunity to hit every student.”