UA News

With savings at the UA BookStores and money-management workshops offered through the Credit-Wise Cats program, students and faculty and staff members - as well as the Tucson community - have money saving options close at hand.

The beginning of the school year has a way of shrinking wallets. A variety of campus resources exist to help University of Arizona students and faculty and staff members get more for their money.

On the UA campus, a CatCard is more than identification – it's a key to deep discounts at the UA BookStores on anything from computers and software to books.

Partnerships with Apple, Microsoft, Amazon and Chegg, and the gently recycled wares sold at the Student Exchange in the Park Student Union, make the UA BookStores hard to beat at the cash register.  

These partnerships and a Lowest Price Guarantee provide UA students who make purchases through the UA BookStores with the same deals or better than what they can find online, said marketing and creative design representative Kurtis Durfey.

Technology partnerships allow the UA to provide similar discounts to those that students can find off campus, but in many cases, Durfey said, the UA can be hard to beat because of educational discounts the University receives, which allow accessories to be added to purchases. "This year, for example, we were able to add a free iTouch and a printer for each Mac purchased," he added.

Durfey also said the UA Computing and Technology store offered software deals that were incomparable. More importantly, purchases made through the UA BookStores help support the UA. "Minus our operating costs, all the revenue we earn goes back into the UA," said Durfey.

The UA BookStores support the Associated Students of the UA and its various clubs as well as provide textbook scholarships to outstanding incoming freshmen and scholarships to its student employees. The Tucson community benefits from free literacy programs held on the first Saturday of every month, including a children's storybook hour with learning activities.

A newly remodeled lower level at the Student Union Memorial Center will be showcased during the Computer and Technology Store grand reopening to be held Sept. 7-10.  

The UA BookStores can seem daunting, but the wait in line is never more than six minutes, said Durfey.

"During the rush season, we hire an additional 350 student employees who work to get you in and out and prepared to go to class," Durfey added.

Perhaps the most conscientious deals can be found at the Park Bookstore. There, shoppers can find gently used items purchased from UA students or staff members, which are resold to anyone with a CatCard.

"The store represents another form of recycling. Our goal is to keep people selling their unused, unwanted or unneeded items to us so we can keep moving that inventory out to people who have use for them," said Clair Bates, a senior in retail and consumer science who has overseen the store since it opened last year.   

Sustainability and awareness are the driving influences for the Student Exchange at the Park Student Union, with pricing set to beat those of similar items found on Craigslist.

The Student Exchange partners with UA Residence Life and Off-Campus Housing to remind students that the store is wheeling and dealing items such as used printers, sofas, calculators, jewelry, iPods, posters desks, dressers, lamps and any most any other household item that makes its way through the door.

Another UA program, Credit-Wise Cats, a part of the Take Charge America Institute for Financial Education and Research at the Norton School of Family and Consumer Sciences, has a financial reach that goes beyond campus.

The program provides the Tucson community and UA campus free money-management workshops that focus on spending plans, saving, credit cards, credit reports, paychecks and the value of an education.

"During the service-fees session and the session on credit scores, people are on the edge of their seats," said Juan Criscomani, who oversees the program in which UA students are hired and trained to provide the community financial workshops.

Though the main focus is to educate UA and area high school students, the program provides workshops for families and younger students as well.

Last year, Criscomani said, the program provided a total of 250 financial workshops, and with the beginning of the school year, the program is busy providing workshops for the incoming UA freshmen class.  

The program is looking to train and hire new representatives this semester like Sarah Kelsey, a family studies and human development student who uses her personal experience and Credit-Wise training to deliver financial management tips to community members on and off campus.