As textbook prices rise, so do allegations of publisher payoffs.

Today’s Miami Herald raises questions about a professor at Miami Dade College who took a trip to San Francisco at the expense of a textbook publisher. The same professor was on a three-member committee that ended up selecting one of that publisher’s books for use in the classroom. A state ethics panel found that the professor “knew or should have known,” according to the newspaper, that the trip was intended to influence his decision.

An article published four years ago in The Chronicle reported that top publishing executives, textbook sales representatives, and professors across the country acknowledged a pattern of ethically questionable financial arrangements between deans and publishers, of kickbacks masquerading as royalties, even of professors’ being paid thousands of dollars to adopt a book.

“To be blunt, you have to find a way to buy off the professor,” said one sales representative at a large textbook company in an increasingly competitive industry.