Every Instructional Resource and Material Centers throughout the nation is trying to do the same thing, and that is to make sure that every student with a visual impairment has what they need. In the month of August all schools will be returning to session, this means a stress test of all our processes and practices. There is no one size fits all for resource centers, we all meet the need in our own way. But, there is power in discussing how we do what we do. It gives the space for others to be creative with ideas they may have not thought of. At the very least we might not need to re-create the wheel because our neighboring state might have an amazing solution to the problem that we are facing. Below are three narratives of how Oklahoma, Colorado and Arizona prepare for the summer and the start of the school year:

From Pepper Watson, Oklahoma Instructional Materials Center:

Around the first week of May, we send out an email asking for the names of all graduating seniors. In June, we also do a query for seniors and compare lists to see who is actually graduating and who will remain for Adult Studies. We then make sure all graduating seniors have returned all items checked out to them. At this point, we either mark them GRADUATED and delete their account from our system (required by our State Dept of Ed) or contact the TVI about items still needing to be returned.

All textbooks are due back to the AIM Center by June 15th so the first thing we do at the beginning of June is find out what books have not yet been returned and send out notices to those TVIs. (Most of our school districts get out May 15th so we have most materials back by the end of May).

During June we also conduct inventory on all 5822 shelves in the AIM Center. I have a staff of four and it takes us all of June to get this completed. Upon completion, we run an inventory report and begin to restock our shelves for the next school year. (We do this throughout the year, but we concentrate efforts now when school is out, and we have a bit more time).

I, personally, do a lot of KLAS maintenance during this time. Everything from lost items to creating new equipment and textbook holdings to updating patron records. If we have a copy of the new APH catalog, I also use this time to update prices in the vendor catalog in KLAS. This saves a bit of time later down the road and also gives me an idea of how much price increase we are dealing with overall. (This year the price increases have been steep, especially on textbooks!)

I divide my federal fiscal year into quarters on my calendar. I then divide my total FQ funds by 4 and make note on my calendar how much I should have spent by each of these dates. I started doing this about 7 years ago and it’s an easy way of tracking funds, so we aren’t going crazy the last month to spend all of our money. We are very fortunate in that we have moveable shelving and have a lot of storage space. Therefore, we can keep our shelves stocked and have very little wait time to get products out to our students.

From Jim Olson, Colorado Instructional Materials Center:

Start early: CIMC has a book order deadline of April 1st every year. For example, the deadline for 2022-2023 book orders was April 1, 2022. We will accept book orders any day of the school year, but do not promise that the TVI will have even one volume of braille if the order is received after the deadline. Of course, we do everything possible to fulfill every book order no matter what time of year it is received. This puts some responsibility on the TVI to coordinate with the classroom teachers to ensure book orders are submitted in a timely manner.

CIMC staff tracks which students typically receive books from us and will reach out to TVIs if they have not ordered books for their student by the deadline. TVIs are busy people! They have a lot on their plate, caseloads change often, and students move around. Contacting the TVI if they have not placed book orders for a particular student saves the CIMC and the TVI a lot of stress later on.

Ship book orders to districts before June, if possible, if we are pulling from our inventory or if the vendor is able to fulfill our order early. A lot of our TVIs like this because they know they have the book waiting for their student when school starts in the fall. This also lessens the workload for the CIMC staff in August since we have already shipped. We try to clarify with TVIs when they place the order whether or not we can ship during the summer months. Making a note in the Material Request module of Klas regarding dates we can or cannot ship for a particular order has helped us stay organized. If you make the note when you create a new order (in the shipping instructions box) it will print on the packing slip. Easy for staff to identify if we are shipping or holding the order. We also put the email address of the TVI who is receiving the book in the shipping instructions box. Any time we ship orders we send a quick email to the TVI so they know to be watching for the shipment to arrive.

Mid-July: Contact braille vendors who still have open orders. Run PO/Requisition listing report in Klas. If possible, we try to let TVIs know the status of their open orders before school starts.

From Jared Leslie, Arizona Instructional Resource Center:

We begin the conversation with teacher in our districts when we begin the Federal Quota Census. In January when we are sending notice about the census, we include language about best practices of thinking for the next school year. This could mean preparing for your equipment needs or your textbook needs. After the census is fully completed in March, we begin our conversations that are singularly focused on equipment and textbooks.

This email notification shares with all teachers what items are checked out including consumable items. Then the teacher indicated what items we expect back at the resource center for inventory and quality checks. If an item or text is going to be utilized next year or over the summer teachers have the option of renewing a checked-out item. After the renewals we begin to start receiving the returns, we get about 2,500 to 3,000 different items that are returned during this time. It takes us about 4-5 weeks to fully process the returns after they are all fully received. At that same time, we are fielding new equipment orders and new textbook orders. Our Quota orders do not get filled/ordered until about halfway through the summer. Our textbooks start ASAP.

Once returns are completed and all our titles are placed with our transcribers, then preparation for shipping begins. The space that we used for receiving returns transitions to a staging area for outbound shipping. We pre-box up all of the items that have been requested waiting for the week for when teachers return. Once we have a confirmation of the teacher work week in a district, we then ship out the completed orders. This allows for items to have less of a likelihood of being lost or misplaced.

As students arrive, this prompts another ordering wave, which is considerably smaller than the summer wave. But, because of this fact we need to maintain some capacity for item fulfillment and braille transcribers.