Elhi College Trade / Reference Other TOTAL

$773.0 million 212.0 million 144.5 million 65.1 million $1.2 billion

-2.6% 14.0% -1.7% 406.8% 5.5%

Steck-Vaughn denies "lefty" exclusion

ORLANDO, Florida, June 16, 2003 -- A story that Steck-Vaughn has a new handbook policy against portraying left-handed people in its school books was denied by company people. Rick Blake, vice president for communication at Harcourt School Publishers in Orlando, Steck-Vaughn's parent company, was in transit on Monday and unavailable for comment. Steve Korte, president of Harcourt Supplementals, Steck-Vaughn's direct parent, in Chicago, was also in transit. But several people at Steck-Vaughn in Austin, Texas, and in Orlando categorically denied the no-leftys-here allegation. The story began with an interview with Diane Ravitch, a noted education writer, who was quoted that she had learned of the Steck-Vaughn policy too late to include in her new book The Language Police (Knopf). That Ravitch made the assertion was first purported on the educationnews.org site. The assertion was reprinted elsewhere, including the Text and Academic Authors site, which, like other derivative news services, offered no attribution nor sought confirmation with Steck-Vaughn, Harcourt or Ravitch. Later, under criticism, educationnews.org said that Ravitch had heard about Steck-Vaughn's handbook second-hand and had since reviewed the Steck-Vaughn document and realized that the restriction was only on people eating with their left hand, which is repulsive in some Middle East cultures.

STECK- VAUGHN RAVITCH Visiting Fellow Hoover Institute Senior Fellow Brookings Institution

Stanford tests given familiar look

ORLANDO, Florida, June 16, 2003 -- Harcourt Education Measurement launched the 10th edition of its Stanford Achievement Test Series with a new look designed to be student-friendly. Margie Jorgensen, vice president of product management, said full color, life-like illustrations make the test booklets resemble instructional materials that students are used to seeing in their classrooms. "Our studies clearly show that children are able to do their best when test materials have a familiar look and feel, appealing artwork and visual clarity," Jorgensen said.

HARCOURT- EDUCATION MEASUREMENT

Study: Web has immediate effect on learning

VICTORIA, British Columbia, June 16, 2003 -- The fourth in a series of McGraw-Hill Ryerson studies on web-based education technology found great increases in college faculty attitudes on the effectiveness of web tools. Fifty-seven percent of the faculty rated technology as important or very imoortant for achieving college success, compared to only only 22 percent in 1999. Eighty-four percent of faculty reported satisfaction in integrating technology into courses. Data were gathered from 1,177 Canadian college instructors from a range of disciplines.

MCGRAW HILL RYERSON

Blackboard users at 225,000 milestone

WASHINGTON, June 16, 2003 -- The CourseCompass management system available to Pearson textbook adopters has more than 225,000 users, Pearson announced. CourseCompass, developed by Blackboard Learning Systems, offers textbook materials, course content management and sharing, online assessments, student tracking, assignment and portfolio management, and virtual collaboration. When CourseCompass was introduced in 1999, many commercial education providers were developing e-learning platforms, but Blackboard has become the model, Pearson said. The company relesased these numbers: 15,800 instructors and 210,000 students have used CourseCompass in 39,000 courses.

COURSE- COMPASS

Projection: Huge college sales growth

2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007

$3.9 million 4.2 million 4.6 million 4.9 million 5.3 million 5.6 million

Scholastic expands reading repertoire

NEW YORK, June 15, 2003 -- School publisher Scholastic introduced several reading programs geared to No Child Left Behind legislation. These include: Action Books: Grades 3-8 reading practice. Fluency Formula: Grades 1-6 supplemental program for word recognition, comprehension. ReadingLine: Pre-K and 1 kits for sounds, letters, vocabulary, phonetics. Sprint: Grades 3-8 intervention program.

SCHOL- ASTIC

Death claims j-historian Dick Schwarzlose

EVANSTON, Illinois, June 14, 2003 -- Historian Richard Schwarzlose, of Northwestern University's Medill School of Journalism, who was at home in the scholarly jouranls of his field, died while bike riding. He was 66. His books included a two-volume study, The Nation's Newsbrokers, (Northwestern University Press, 1989-1990). Schwarzlose co-edited The Chicago Diaries of John M. Wing: 1865-1866 (Southern Illinois University Press, 2002),written by fledgling journalist John Mansir Wing in rough-and-tumble Chicago after the Civil War. Schwarzlose joined the Medill faculty in 1968 and was its most senior member. Said Dean Loren Ghiglione: "He taught more courses, advised more students, served on more committees, chaired more committees, visited more alumni, spoke at more faculty colloquia, wrote more books and articles and counseled more faculty on their road to promotion and tenure than almost any faculty member in the school's 82-year history." Schwarzlose primarily taught ethics and journalism history. He was known for using the Socratic method of teaching. This year the students named him to the faculty honor roll. He had been associate dean. Said Ghiglione: "He was an agent for progressive change at Medill."

RICHARD SCHWARZLOSE 1937-2003

Publishers selling more e-content

WASHINGTON, June 14, 2003 -- With sales of $900,000, sales of e-book content was up 268 percent in April, compared to a year earlier, according to the Association of American Publishers. For the year through April, sales were up 160.8 percent. "While the nascent e-book market is growing fast, it is still a diminutive part of the industry with relatively small sales figures compared to all other book categories," the AAP said.

Edward L. Ayers (history), University of Virginia, Lewis L. Gould (history), University of Texas, Austin (emeritus), David M. Oshinsky (history), University of Texas at Austin, and Jean R. Soderlund (history), Lehigh University, wrote the second edition of American Passages -- A History of the American People, Volume I: To 1877; Volume II, Since 1863, as well as a comprehensive volume (Wadsworth). Cecie Starr (biology), and Ralph Taggart (biology) Michigan State University, wrote the 10th edition of Cell Biology and Genetics (Wadsworth). Frank Wang, former chair of Saxon Publishers, was appointed a visiting professor at the University of Oklahoma in science and math. Joseph Zajda (education), University of Melbourne, wrote Society and the Environment: Teaching (James Nicholas).

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Delta plans summer kids books

El-hi sales in slow recovery

WASHINGTON, June 12, 2003 -- At $173.8 million, U.S. school book sales in April outpaced the same month a year earlier by 17.1 percent, according to the latest report from the Association of American Publishers. Although April brightened the el-hi situation, sales remained depressed by state budget problems that are delaying purchases. For the year to date, el-hi sales through April were 12.7 percent ahead of the dismal first four months the year before. College sales were off dramatically for April, but AAP attributed the drop to seasonal returns of unsold copies from college stores. Year-to-date, college sales were off 11.7 percent through April. Here are the year-to-date AAP data for April, extrapolated from 74 member-publishers, for genres in which academic authors write: El-hi University press (hard) University press (soft) Professional, scholarly College 17.1 percent Unchanged -14.2 percent -19.3 percent -162.9 percent

EARLIER DATA

Gemstar scaling back on e-books

Doubts heighten on Vivendi Europe sale

BRUSSELS, June 10, 2003 -- The European Commission opened a four-month in-depth review of the planned sale of Vivendi's European publishing units to Lagardere. Observers said the review is not a good sign for the deal, indicating that the Commission has major doubts about the impact the transaction would have on other publishing companies.

VIVENDI EARLIER ARTICLES Vivendi trying to narrow focus more Houghton makes post- Vivendi divestiture Consensus: Houghton will be dissected

Two Malayasian piracy shops raided

WASHINGTON, June 9, 2003 -- Two photocopy shops have been raided near Multimedia University in the Malaysian state of Malaka, with authorities reporting the seizure of 204 copies of U.S. textbooks being reproduced without copyright permission. The raids targeted DIS-TRO and Photostat Lucky copyshops. The books were in business, physics, and mathematics, published by Pearson, McGraw-Hill, Thomson, Wiley, and Cambridge University Press. In Washington, the Association of American Publishers said legal action will be pursued. The raids were part of an ongoing campaign to monitor anti-piracy activities and illustrate the importance of international copyright enforcement.

William M. Anderson (music education), Kent State University, and Joy E. Lawrence (music education), Kent State University (emeritus), wrote the sixth edition of Integrating Music into the Elementary Classroom (Wadsworth). Peter-John Leone, director at Indiana University Press, resigned to pursue other interests. Pending a search, Leone's responsibilities will be assumed by Janet Rabinowitch, editorial director. Robert Sloan, senior sponsoring editor, will serve as editorial director. Samuel A. Vigil (civil engineering), California Polytechnic University, San Luis Obispo, and Robert J. Lang (civil engineering), California Polytechnic University, San Luis Obispo, wrote Civil and Environmental Engineering Design (Wadsworth).

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Addison-Wesley launches Microsoft series

BOSTON, Massachusetts, June 8, 2003 -- Publisher Addison-Wesley, whose repertoire includes computer technology, signed an agreement with Microsoft to publish a series on Microsoft Windows servers. Info-tech experts, including developers from the Microsoft Windows and Server Division, will write and technically review books for various Windows servers, including Windows 2003, BizTalk 2002, SQL and the forthcoming Exchange 2003. The series follows the Microsoft .NET Development Series. The new series will maintain a co-branded look and feel with the .NET series, Addison said.

ADDISON- WESLEY

Scholastic drops 400 employees

NEW YORK, June 7, 2003 -- Publishing house Scholastic eliminated 400 positions, about 4 percent of its global staff, in the wake of falling earnings. The affected employees will all be gone over the next few weeks, the company said. The cuts were described as "across the board," in the book group, education, library publishing, Internet operations, and corporate staff. Said chair Dick Robinson: "In today's difficult environment, we need to continue to reduce our cost structure to achieve greater operating efficiency and profitability." Robinson predicted a better fiscal 2004." Meanwhile, the company plans an after-tax charge of $7 million in the fourth quarter to cover severance and other related costs. Scholastic has been steadily tightening its financial belt since the beginning of the calendar year, following a terrible January when sales were particularly weak in the company's trade and school book club divisions.

SCHOLASTIC

Pearson launches Pi science imprint

UPPER SADDLE RIVER, New Jersey, June 6, 2003 -- Pearson Education has created a new science imprint, Pi Press, that will draw on the Pearson Technology Group scientists and educators to create books for a mass audience. "We are building books that will arrest the attention of the general science reader with great writing, authority, and all the beauty of science," said Stephen Morrow, Pi executive editor. The inaugural signing on the list is a definitive, full-color exploration of the lives of the largest animals to ever fly, Pterosaur: Flying Dragons of Deep Time, by David Unwin, fossils curator at the Humboldt Museum in Berlin. Signed later but due this fall is Fred Adams' Our Living Multiverse. In addition, Norton's Star Atlas, a reference book first published in 1910, will be reissued. Pi Press is expected to produce 20 new titles a year, Morrow said.

PI PRESS

Delta issues Harry Potter kits

McGraw starts DOI tagging

NEW YORK, June 5, 2003 -- McGraw-Hill Education has begun tagging its textbooks with digital object identifiers to facilitatee online transactions between the publisher and its customers. The DOI tags look like a digital bar code. The tags can link users to where they can buy a given book, see additional information about the book, and find other books by the same author or on the same subject. The tags also enable online transactions, including e-commerce, rights management and digital distribution. DOI was introduced to by the Association of American Publishers in 1996, which conceived it primarily for scientific journals.

MCGRAW HILL EDUCATION

Ed publishers choose finalists

School book sales facing dry patch

Pennsylvania uses Harcourt tests

ORLANDO, Florida, June 3, 2003 -- The Pennsylvania Department of Education signed a two-year contract with Harcourt Educational Measurement for English proficiency testing in 501 school disticts, Harcourt announced. The K-12 tests will assess comprehension, listing, speaking, reading and writing skills to comply with No Child Left Behind legislation.

Robert H. Frank (economics), Cornell University, wrote the fifth edition of Microeconomics and Behavior (McGraw-Hill Irwin). Clifford Janey, superintendent of Rochester, New York, schools, was named education vice president at Scholastic. Alexander T. Wells (aviation), Embry-Riddle Aeronautical Unversity, and John G. Wensveen (aviation), Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University, wrote the fifth edition of Air Transportation -- A Management Perspective (Wadsworth).

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Sundance offers vowel big books

MIT enters print-on-demand field

El-hi state fundings faces cuts

Educational Development Corporation: Sales gew 31.1 percent in the home-sales division to $17.3 million in the fiscal year that ended February 28. Pretax earnings grew 36.6 pecent to $3.9 million. Sales in the publishing division grew 2.7 percent to $7.6 million; earnings were flat.

Varsity Books: Sales grew 53 percent to $1.2 million in the first quarter, compared to a year earlier, due mostly to online bookstore services for private high schools and small colleges. The loss for the quarter was $444,000, compared to $465,000 a year earlier.

SA2 site carried 73 May items