Policy 5.2.1 - Print Management Guidelines

Date: February 22, 2016

Supersedes:
NA

SUNY Schenectady has installed multi-function copiers in the library for use by students and the public. In Fall 2014, a print management system was installed on those copiers and on printers throughout the college. The goal of the system is to reduce the financial and environmental impact of printing activity by providing per-student visibility to their own printing habits. This system has been partially implemented, and it is the intent of the college to move forward to full implementation during the 2015-2016 school year.

  • In accordance with full implementation, each student (full or part-time, credit or
    non-credit) will receive a $30 allocation per semester print allocation.

Print Rates will be periodically set by the Office of Administration. Initially these rates will be set at:

  • $.15 cents per sheet of paper (both sides of one sheet of paper)
  • $.10 per sheet of paper (one side of a sheet of paper)

Printing will be set to default to duplex (two-sided printing) where that option is available. Printers that do not have a duplex option will be phased out, and replaced with units that include the duplex printing option. If the student has a special need for single sided printing, they must request that the printer setting be changed. At this time, black and white printing only is available.

The print allocations are included in the student technology fees. Any unused portion of this print allocation will not be carried forward at the end of the semester nor will it be refundable upon graduation or when a student leaves the college. If a student has added money to their account to increase the amount of printing that is available to them, that money will be carried over. The Papercut software offers a number of ways for the student to add money to their account-from a manual process that can take place at any point of sale around the college to an on-line interface where funds can be loaded using a PayPal account or credit card.

Logon Balance Confirmation - When students log onto a computer they will receive a pop-up dialog box showing their print balance. The dialog box includes a link (“Details…”) the student may use to review his/her print history and its environmental impact.

Print Confirmation Dialog - When a student sends something to the printer, he/she will receive a confirmation dialog box showing what the print job will cost, and they will be asked to confirm to continue. If confirmation is not sent within 2 hours, the job is flushed from the queue and the account will not be charged.

Swipe and Release – Select printers around the campus have been outfitted with a “swipe and release” print queue. To use this queue, students will simply print document(s) to the printer; the printer will hold the document until the student swipes his/her Student ID at the printer to release the documents from the hold queue. The document will then print out. Documents in the hold queue will be held for up to 2 hours.

Overdraft Buffer - The system is configured to allow each student a $5 overdraft buffer in addition to the print allocation. The overdraft buffer is designed to allow the student to complete their printing when they have exhausted their balance and are unable to load additional funds into the account. Once the overdraft balance is exhausted, the student will need to load additional money into his/her account in order to continue printing. If the student has used a portion or all of their overdraft account and not paid it back to the college, the new allocation issued the following semester will be reduced by that amount.

Refund Policy - There are cases when the college will consider a request to refund an individual print job. If an individual print job fails to print properly and the total charged for the job is $3.00 or more, please submit a work order request to the IT Helpdesk at helpdesk@sunysccc.edu with the following information:

  • Username
  • Amount charged
  • Time of print
  • Location of print
  • Document title
    Reason for refund (faded/illegible type, printer jam, power outage, etc.)

Refund requests should be made immediately, but no later than 48 hours after the incident. You may be asked to show the print job to an IT employee before a refund is processed. Please note that problems due to user error including the incorrect selection of printer or print options are not grounds for a refund to be granted.

Requesting Increase in Print Balance

If an instructor believes for academic reasons that the print allocation will be insufficient to meet the academic needs of their students in a particular class, the instructor may request from their dean an increase in the allocation for that class, and provide justification for same. If the dean approves the request, the dean will information the IT Department which will make the adjustment. Additional printing allocations will not be granted automatically, and students who exceed their allocation must pay for additional print privileges if they are needed. Note that this will not apply if the student’s instructor has obtained an increase of the print allocation for students taking a particular course.

When this policy has been fully implemented, students can add money to their Duck Bill account in the cafeteria or other points of sale around the main campus.

Financial and Environmental Impact

When lease fees, usage fees, costs of paper and labor are taken into account, the cost of operating just 2 MFPs in the library is almost $20,000 annually.

Reducing the amount of printing will help save money. The less money the College spends on printing the more money is available to create or upgrade computer labs, and provide other teaching and learning programs and amenities for students.

The environmental impact of printing activity for FY 2014 was that the College consumed 4,810,000 (yes, million!) sheets of paper; in FY 2015, that number went down to an estimated 4,406,849 sheets. This decrease of 8.38%, despite college expansion, shows that our efforts to manage our printing and mitigate our footprint are working and that we need to continue these efforts.