Paper Exploitation

We use an insane amount of paper at this school. Surely you’ve seen it walking down the halls with pin boards full of announcements and QR codes to scan and student made work. With teachers printing exorbitant amounts every week the question becomes is it really worth it? Teachers print everything, from readings, to simple get to know you sheets, to actual work. But what needs to be printed and what doesn’t? When asked about the amount of paper printed at Roosevelt, Our resident IT guy, Nick Hernandez, informed me that since the start of the fiscal year (July 2024) to October, the entirety of Roosevelt staff and teachers have printed 344,171 sheets of paper from the school printers, and of course this doesn’t count copies by students. I asked several teachers about what they print and what they print for. Some teachers who have an excessive amount of paper being printed, especially those with Advanced Placement classes are printing readings.Teachers also print worksheets and tests, but most teachers who I asked attribute the majority of their paper usage to readings for students. This is due to the fact that a lot of teachers haven’t gotten their textbooks delivered yet, which forces teachers to print insane amounts. Take for example, Mr Holland’s AP US History class, a class that across the country is regarded as one of the hardest AP classes, partially due to the insane amount of memorization, and reading. This class required 930 pages of paper in one week alone, solely due to the fact that the required textbooks were not yet available, and class must continue. The same issue has been presented in AP Modern World History where the required textbooks were not yet delivered, meaning that, coupled with in-class work like maps and spatial environments, there has been 3,640 pages printed in one week alone for just one teacher.
The environmental impact is overwhelming to fathom. Those 344,171 sheets of paper used? They amount to 41.3 trees. To put that into perspective 41.3 trees is a tad bit less than it takes to build a 2600 sq foot house. This feels absurd. The effects of deforestation are simply astoundingly concerning, ranging from loss of habitat for animals, leading to potential extinction, to increased fire risk for local forests. But obviously the environmental impact is not the only impact that needs to be discussed, one must also consider how it affects students’ learning. When asked, Roosevelt students have said that they learn significantly better when reading on paper as opposed to their computers , and that their notes are also more conducive to their learning. This is shown in a University of Louisville study from 2022 where they found that university students did better on a test when they had handwritten notes as opposed to typing the notes. With this coupled with the environmental impact becomes a complicated topic of what is the best decision for teachers to make. So which is more important for teachers? The individual contribution they have to the whole school’s environmental impact or the benefits for their students? What is a single teacher’s obligation? Surely there is a potential compromise, but will that be in a public schools current budget? Who knows. Surely not me.