Passing the Test
The in-plant for the Bethel, Wash., public school system turned out more than 44.6 million impressions in 2006, most of them in the form of booklets.
“We average between 20-25,000 booklets a day,” reports Diane Karl, print shop manager.
The in-plant initially adopted the booklet format in order to help students.
“If students can do their general work in the same fashion as the tests they have to take for an assessment of scholastic learning, they’ll be more proficient when they take the tests,” says Karl. “It’s cost effective for us to make the booklets and easy for our students to use. Then we decided that we could do other work the same way.”
The Bethel Public Schools in-plant runs two Kodak Digimasters, one of which has a booklet maker on it. Karl says that according to vendor service people, “we use our booklet maker more than anyone else in the U.S. We use it to fold, tab and label newsletters and other material sent out district-wide rather than collating it.” This level of productivity does have a down side. “The other day, we had to replace a belt on the machine that no one else has ever broken before,” she says.
Karl’s in-plant, which has five full-time employees and two staff members who work one or two hours daily, aims to fulfill all classroom orders in 24 hours—a goal that’s aided by the ability to take orders via e-mail through scanners.
“The district had been using work order couriers to go to buildings, collect orders, and bring them to us, but we were wondering how to get the orders quicker,” she says. “We were doing a copier bid at the time, so we included scanners in the bid. Our technical person then set it up so that teachers can scan their orders from the copiers [Konica Minolta 7155s and 7145s]. A lot of schools do this for 100 percent of their orders, and they’ll receive those jobs the next day by courier.
“We have so many digital files in house,” continues Karl, “that they can say they want a reorder of Grade 2 Math test #4 for so many copies, and we’ll pull the file and send off the order. It’s worked pretty well for us, and the rest of the districts in the state are trying to emulate what we’ve done.”
The in-plant’s efforts are certainly appreciated by the Bethel school district.
“Print services staff go out of their way to be helpful and produce great looking copy,” remarks Peggy Brayton, with the Office of Professional Development. Adds Melissa Wolslegel, a teacher at Evergreen Elementary, “It is always a pleasure to work with Diane and her staff. They are extremely professional and accommodating. They truly understand that they are here for our students. Their support makes our job—meeting the needs of the children—easier.”
—By W. Eric Martin
