In the Rough - The Blog of Joel McDonald Jr.

Yesterday afternoon, I sat down with a movie that I had been wanting to see for quite a while, “An Inconvenient Truth”. This film captures Al Gore as he travels the world presenting “the slide show” in an attempt to educate the world on the real and present danger of global warming and the possibilities of reversing our accelerating path to a global climate crises.If you haven’t seen this movie, see it soon, today if possible. There is a reason this man, and researchers on the topic, won the Nobel Prize last year. The evidence, undeniably stunning correlated data, that our actions are having a huge impact on the climate is impossible to ignore. This is not theory, it’s not political. Global warming will change our world as we know it if we do not take the necessary steps to reverse our impact.

See the movie, make whatever changes you can, and tell people about it. Write your elected officials and demand that we unite in a War Against Climate Change. I am convinced that we must change, immediately.

Another activity I finally got around to is checking out World of WarCraft, and seeing if it really is as good people claim it is. I spent a good chuck of hours playing last night, and as far as I can remember, my character is a priestly Night Elf. If you want to look me up, his name is Abelzier. World of WarCraft is a subscription based game, but they are offering a 10 day trial. I was up and running very quickly, and game-play has been very smooth, even though I didn’t download the full (4GB) program. Who knows how I’ll feel about the game after my trial period is over. For now, I can admit that it is mildly addicting, as there is always something to do!

Bill Gates in his Business at the Speed of Thought related a story where he asked to be brought all the forms that Microsoft uses to record employee information. He was brought a obscene number of forms used. Upon questioning why Microsoft, a leader in technology, was relying on paper forms for their business processes, he paired down the stack of forms given to him to only two that could not be digitize due to federal law. By questioning the purpose for each form, he was able to streamline his business processes and create a more efficient, and environmental friendly, company.Often at Luxford, I raise the same kind of questions that Gates raised at Microsoft. I’m known for asking, does this need to be printed? Need is the operative word, compared to want. As the school Data Support Specialist, I provide reports to a faculty of 34 teachers regarding over 500 students. The amount of paper, and the costs attached can be staggering.

For example, the city of Virginia Beach requires twelve assessments to be given across elementary school grades. The reports generated for one assessment is around 250 pages, about half a ream of paper. Last year I printed reports and distributed them to teachers. This process for very time consuming. This year, by customizing reports and the process for generating them, they are distributed as PDF files onto to the school’s intranet, which is powered by SharePoint. Not only does not allow for electronic distribution, but it also effectively organizes reports throughout the school year and is assessable by teachers and administration alike. While teachers have the option to print their reports if they would like, this system allows for the possibility of saving about 3,000 pages of paper.

Another example is a modification I’ve made to the process of verifying progress report and report card drafts. The city process includes the printing of drafts to be verified by teachers. With 520 students, this equates to approximately 4,160 pages of printed paper that will be utilized for a moment, and then destroyed. Seeing no need for paper drafts to be printed, our modified process has PDF drafts sent via e-mail to teachers. They are able to review them on screen, make necessary changes, and then request updated drafts to be sent to them. Not only has this process reduced the amount of paper used in the process, but it allows greater flexibility in correct errors, efficiency in generating additional drafts, and confidence that the process will produce correct final copies.

One final example this year is the digitizing of the school’s employee handbook. This handbook includes maps, rosters, regulations, and forms for both the school and school system. For many years, a three inch binder containing this handbook was given to every employee at the start of every year. The cost for having this handbook printed each year was $1,000. This year, we utilized the school intranet and posted the handbook files to the SharePoint site, enabling access from both school and home. Not only did this save the school $1,000, but it also saved over 12,000 pages from being printed and possibly never used.

Paper, compared to many commodities, is relatively cheap. At the school discount, the total savings for the above examples was only $1,043, including the cost of having the handbook printed. Fiscally, this isn’t a very significant number, especially when you consider that only a fraction of the total savings is the actual cost of paper. However, over 19,000 pages of paper has been reduced from our processes. If every elementary school in Virginia Beach followed the above processes, approximately 1,053,800 pages of paper could be saved every year! This is, according to one calculation, the equivalent of 13 trees, if the paper contains no recycled fiber.

These examples are evidence that with little thought and the ability to improvise and adapt, technology can help the environment. Here at Luxford, I’m using technology to save trees, one page at a time.

This post is written to participate in Blog Action Day 2007, where bloggers around the world write on one topic, on one day: the environment.