I echo much of what has already been said - banish inkjets, drive prints
to multi-function devices, standardize platforms wherever possible, and
try to move away from the "no classroom left behind" model and find
convenient, centralized locations for printer-copiers. We also just moved
from a bizhub lease to a Xerox one, and we've been happy - the WorkCentre
56xx series is quite nice, and we've saved a bit of money with the new
lease as well.
Another layer I added in this past summer was centralized print monitoring
and quota management. I used [ http://www.papercut.com/products/ng/
]PaperCut NG, which has been fantastic - really well-developed and thought
out. I downloaded the trial version in August, played with it and set up a
print server, and everything worked so well I decided to roll it out at
the start of the school year. YMMV, of course, and I know there are many
admins out there who hear "print server" and begin frothing at the mouth,
but it's been amazing here for the amount of "printing awareness" it has
raised. Our girls are much more conscientious about what they print, and
where - color copies cost 5x what black-and-white ones do, and that's
something they understand now. Even the teachers (who have no quotas)
print big jobs, see their quote decrease, and start abjectly apologizing
for printing too much. I call that a win. The downside is that clearing
print queue hang-ups now falls to the tech team rather than individual
users, but it's a small price and it doesn't happen terribly often anymore.
Although I don't have numbers yet, I'm confident that printer monitoring
and management coupled with tossing out inkjets and driving prints to MFDs
will make a significant impact in our overall printing costs.
Hope this helps - it's nice to feel like we're all wrestling the same
ink-stained beast...
Doug
--
Doug Alexander
Director of Academic Technology
Lincoln School, Providence RI
401-455-1137
>Hello Everyone,
>
>We are trying to come up with a new printing strategy for our PK-12
>school.
>We currently have a mixture of b/w laser and many inkjets, all teachers
>have
>a printer in their classroom and each building has several laser printers
>that can be printed to.
>
>Would like to know what other schools are doing as far as printing
>strategies go?
>Any input would be helpful.
>
>Thank You,
>
>Brandon Watkins
>Director of Technology
>The Independent School
>
>[ For info on ISED-L see https://www.gds.org/podium/default.aspx?t=128874
>]
>Submissions to ISED-L are released under a creative commons, attribution,
>non-commercial, share-alike license.
>RSS Feed, http://listserv.syr.edu/scripts/wa.exe?RSS&L=ISED-L
>
[ For info on ISED-L see https://www.gds.org/podium/default.aspx?t=128874 ]
Submissions to ISED-L are released under a creative commons, attribution, non-commercial, share-alike license.
RSS Feed, http://listserv.syr.edu/scripts/wa.exe?RSS&L=ISED-L
