The Cheaper Printing for Schools Bandwagon!
Tom Farber, what have you done?!? Saved a few people a buck, I suppose.
In case you haven’t heard, Farber tried to offset printing costs for his Rancho Bernardo, CA high school by selling ads on tests:
“Farber started letting parents and local businesses sponsor tests this fall after learning budget cuts would limit his in-school printing allowance — tracked by the school’s copy machines — to $316 for the year. The cost of printing quizzes and tests for his 167 students will easily be more than $500, he said.
That meant Farber, whose courses prepare students for the Advanced Placement exam, would have to give fewer or shorter tests, or find money. Farber, who says 90 percent of his students got a 5 — the top score — on AP exams last year, said skimping wasn’t an option.”
Oddly enough, I don’t remember a story about how Farber was a remarkable teacher who got 90% of his students a 5 on the AP exam.
Must’ve gotten lost in the shuffle. Maybe now that he’s famous for generating $300 of ad revenue, someone might notice he’s pretty awesome at his job.
Anyway, printing companies are realizing that schools can’t keep doing everything in-house, whether it’s newsletters, premium/promotional items, laminating, etc. That, and putting a company’s lips to the public teat is appealing.
PSPrint education has a 15% discount for educators/schools now. I’ve come across them before as doing sticker and brochure printing, but why not use private services like these to print mundane stuff like tests?
I forget which web app I used to send print jobs directly to a huge printing/office supply chain… but it was very cheap, very handy. Why not contract printing services out from schools to those chains? Send the print job, pick up the box - or have a runner do it once in the morning, once in the evening. Boom! More instructional time, cheaper for the district, etc. etc.
Who’s going to pitch these services first? Staples, Office Max? We all know the admins won’t go seeking out sensible contracting deals. Or they might. Who’s going to surprise me?
4 Responses to “The Cheaper Printing for Schools Bandwagon!”
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The district I worked in last year (for 6 years) had its own print shop. We would send our items to be copied two days in advance or so. They would also, for a small fee, make posters for us, laminate, etc. Our department had a budget, and our department head would keep us updated about how our budget was doing. We also planned extensively so that we knew exactly what was going to the print shop, and how much. Any extras we could do on our own at the school. We had a budget for paper there as well, and when it ran out, it ran out. All in all, it was a pretty good deal compared to my school now - where I spend every single day at the copy machine since we don’t have any books which match the curriculum we’re required to use. So now, not only do I have to chase down ALL the literature I’m supposed to use in my classes (including some novels!), copy it, and make copies for my students, I also have to fight over the three copiers we have for the entire school. So far, I haven’t had to pay for paper. There’s also an enormous amount of waste generated each day when the copiers get too hot and start to jam. It’s the most inconvenient and backward system I’ve ever seen.
redkudu,
I’ve been thinking today how big a school would have to be to make use of a private printshop or hire out. The conclusion I’ve come to? Not very big at all.
The opportunity cost for teachers is just too high - too many spend significant portions of their day doing what you described. If we crunched the numbers in terms of salary+benefits only, the cost for a district would be obscene and would instantly justify an alternate printing solution.
Good Lord, this is Econ 101 and the schools still don’t have a handle on it.
Office Depot already offers this service and has a business web site where the districts can actually archive their documents. They have a VERY inexpensive pricing and free shipping through their U.S. Communities contract
I think the bigger problem with a situation like this is if the school is like mine now - and nobody knows what’s going to happen from one day to the next because the idea of planning anything well is so abhorrent to the idea of providing an “organic, adaptable” learning experience. Rather than just a really, really, good one, I suppose.