Campus Store

Please watch this video for an in-depth tutorial of the new system

The Akademos course material adoption portal helps faculty and staff consolidate efforts and quickly submit their information. It is designed to make the adoption of textbooks and course materials for the upcoming academic term easier and more efficient for the entire campus community. Some departments have staff members who collect and coordinate adoptions on behalf of the department. The portal will facilitate this process as well.

Faculty will submit their course materials through the Akademos Adoption & Analytics portal

For administrative access please send your request to Ryan.Licari@vitalsource.com. Once access has been granted there is additional training materials available for users. 

• Video Training

The Higher Education Opportunities Act requires higher education institutions to provide the list of assigned textbooks for each course (including ISBNs and prices) during registration. Based on the RIT Academic Year Calendar adoptions will be due approximately 6 weeks prior to the start of a semester. RIT strives to achieve HEOA textbook adoption compliance for at least 95% of all courses as soon as possible, but no later than two weeks before the start of class.

An email notification will be sent out through the Portal and/or academic offices will send out messaging to faculty letting them know when the bookstore is open and when the deadline to submit is.

RIT is required by federal law under the Higher Education Opportunity Act of 2008 (HEOA) to inform students of their textbook and course materials and the associated costs at time of class registration. We rely on you and your use of the adoptions analytics portal to be compliant and to be accountable to our students. Posting textbook and course material lists only on course info sites, like Moodle or Colleague, or directing students to view a syllabus does not fulfill the HEOA requirements. Instructors and staff still need to enter this information into the Akademos Portal.

Yes. Akademos recognizes that developing or using OER materials is one of the ways that faculty members can save students money on textbook costs. Through the adoption portal, faculty will be able to indicate when a course uses OER/zero cost materials and can provide a note or link to the location where students can access these items directly.

We have a pdf guide available for faculty to review

4-6 weeks, depending on the publisher.

Several automated email reminders will be sent to faculty with reminders to submit their course material adoptions. Once completed, the emails will no longer generate.

Every effort is made to provide course materials at the least expensive cost to students. This includes giving multiple options to students to purchase materials either new or used, or in different media type, such as hard copy or digital. When you enter your adoption into https://www.rit.edu/virtualbookstore you can enter multiple adoptions for the same course materials such as a standalone text that offers various purchase options such as hard bound, paperback, loose leaf, or digital content with options to purchase, rent, and new or used; the stand alone digital content; or the bundled product and then using the Student Comments section to explain how these various options work.

Items that you have added to a course in prior terms will show in the course history. Click “View All History” to see all items that were assigned to the course in prior terms. Click "My Department" to view adoptions made by other faculty for the same course.

*Using the course history option is the fastest way to re-adopt materials.

In the Adoption & Analytics Portal there is an option for Faculty to designate whether a text is required or optional.

If your course does not use traditional textbooks or course materials, you can indicate that in the Portal by checking the box, “Alternate Adoption Settings" and then selecting one of the listed reasons (1. course does not use books, 2. OER/Zero Cost, or 3. Other non-bookstore materials). Once you select an alternate setting, click "Continue" to submit it to the Bookstore. This marks the course as complete. When students visit the bookstore, they will see messaging saying that they do not need to make a purchase. You can add a course note with further information if you like. For example, if you are using Open Educational Resources, like OpenStax, you can choose the alternate setting "Course uses OER/Zero cost materials" and then add a link to the materials in your course note.

Faculty must request desk copies directly from the publisher/publisher's representative. Links to request copies are usually found on the publisher's site on the product page or help page. You can also request ebook access through VitalSource

Faculty members use the convenient web portal to submit their course materials in advance of each semester. Using this portal, faculty view the courses they will be teaching, select the materials they want to use, and see what costs would be for students. They also have convenient help videos that walk through some of the options available to faculty members.