Unknowingly Sitting on the Golden Egg
by Paul Lewis
“Those who cannot learn from history are doomed to repeat it.” George Santayana
The above quote is aimed at those who foolishly continue to make the same mistakes, but it is also relevant for those who have successes, but fail to replicate them in new situations. Is our profession guilty of not building on its successes? I think so and our most grievous shortfall is not properly recognizing the golden egg we have right at this very moment.
We go through much hand wringing over the lack of readily available textbooks in appropriate media for the students we serve. Our main scapegoat of late is the publishers who make it difficult to acquire their electronic files so we can make textbooks quickly. These publishers should have a lot of guilt, but we should bear the brunt of the problem. What if we could reduce that problem significantly over a few years? What if we could increase availability by three, six, or even ten-fold and save millions of dollars and trees at the same time? Would anyone be interested?
During the 1950s, volunteer braillists were organized and producing reams of Braille textbooks for school children. Duplication of effort was frustrating and was later addressed by the American Printing House’s establishment of a “Central Catalog”. Published annually and with information available for a phone call, the Central Catalog told one transcriber that another transcriber in some other part of the country had already started that book and to move on to another. This system worked well and made the effort much more effective. The Central Catalog approach lives on today as “Louis”, which is an on-line system and available to anyone, but for the most part it is still the Central Catalog in a different costume. It is just easier to use and faster than the old system. Sadly though, what is missing from this system is the most critical information. How many copies of this textbook have been produced, are not being used, and where are they?
During the 1960s, a few states began to recognize that if they brought all of the specialized textbooks in their state together in one central depository or instructional materials center and received requests from teachers to borrow those textbooks, the use of resources and the timely delivery would improve. They were so correct in this assumption that many, if not most, states today have used that model in one variation or another to improve their services. Their combined ability to deliver textbooks today dwarfs any of the major providers or even the providers combined.
During the 1980s, state instructional materials centers around the country started communicating their textbook needs to others via an early form of what we know today as e-mail. States would share textbooks they had and were not using with other states that needed them. This informal system is still in place today, but with effectiveness far below its potential.
So what is the success we achieved that we failed to exploit to our advantage? The answer may be obvious to you now, but, just in case it isn’t, I will explain. First, consider the successes of the states that set up central depositories. They were able to re-use textbooks at a much higher rate because they knew where they were and they sent them out immediately without having to purchase a new copy. They saved time and money. This concept has been proven to work and almost no one would argue against it.
Why wouldn’t this work on a larger scale? In answering that question, we can first start small by taking just five states. Choose any you want so long as they like each other. Tear down the state borders and toss all of their textbook collections into one large database. Allow them to draw from the available textbooks however they want. If they find what they want in the database, they request it, use it, and then return it to the owner state. If they can’t find a textbook in the database, they buy one, use it, and put it back in the database and make it available to the others. This is a “free market” approach and it creates delivery power and could save many scarce dollars. Add a few more states and the delivery power increases many times.
By the way, parochialism has no place in the new free market although it exists widely today. States that don’t contribute should get nothing for their poor effort. Sharing across state lines would be the norm and if your state doesn’t allow such activity then you lose. The rules are pretty simple, but there are two genuine concerns to recognize first and I will cover those now.
Not all state efforts toward providing a free and appropriate education to blind and visually impaired students are created equal. Regardless of size, some states just don’t take this responsibility seriously enough. Level of effort and efficient delivery designs vary widely. Should those who exert the least level of effort share equally in the free market or should they be somewhat restricted? Long ago, someone should have developed a median level of effort for states so they could be ranked by their commitment, but without that information states would have to be ranked by what they contribute to the free market in the way of new textbooks as a ratio to what they take. If you are mathematically inclined, that would show contributions divided by textbooks borrowed equals level of effort (C/B=LE). If that ratio were to be one (1.00) or more, the level of effort would be considered acceptable. If it were below one, the state would become suspect and subsequently restricted in some way. But, those details can be worked out later and be enforced through rules in the database.
The second problem is a bit academic. Those “for profit” and “not for profit” commercial producers will not like the idea of a free market one bit. In fact, they would oppose such an idea simply because it is their business to duplicate effort and produce a new copy of a textbook regardless if one is actually available or not. Whether it’s Federal Quota or cash, it doesn’t matter; they want to make another copy just for you. Finding an available textbook in another state is the antithesis of their mission. I don’t blame them for this attitude, but who should be in charge here?
Simply expanding Louis to reveal where textbooks are available is not the answer and will also never happen. If we think ahead, we can do a little of our own household chores by simply expanding a proven system that breaks down state borders, ensures equity, and ultimately does what we are here to do using our own ingenuity and resources. The benefits will be enormous and rewarding. Is this a discussion worth having?