Get rid of old stuffs
By Sarina Ao

A poster promotes the service of second-hand textbook sales.	Used textbooks are available in various subjects.

                                                                                                                              
The Student Union of the University of Macao (UMSU) set up a counter on the first floor of the Tai Fung building to sell second-hand textbooks from September 10 to 19. 

Many students want to get rid of old textbooks while new students look for bargains in buying second-hand textbooks. The textbook resale is the first effort of UMSU to serve the interests of both student groups by setting up a counter.

The counter was open from 10:45a.m. - 3:45p.m. for students to buy old textbooks. UMSU collected old textbooks for reselling during September 6-8. These books were collected from students in every faculty and also pre-university progammes.

According to Silva Leong, Internal Financial Secretary of the Student Union, this was the first time that they offered a textbook resale service. In previous years, they usually posted information on campus and inside the Student Center for the trading of second-hand textbooks, and distributed leaflets on the campus to let students be aware of this service. Then they waited for the students to go to the Student Center to sell and buy their old textbooks. 

But not many students knew about this service. So this semester they decided to set up an outdoor counter instead. First, they handed out leaflets during the registration period, which informed students that they could put down their textbooks for sales at the counter. Leong said that they sold about 10 to 20 textbooks a day. She felt this move was more successful than before and they would continue doing so next semester.

Some students said that they even did not know that there was such a service last year; they noticed the service this year because they saw the counter at the Tai Fung building. Some of the students said that the service could help them buy some of the textbooks they needed. However, some courses had changed textbooks, so that the old books could not be used, one student commented.