Earn and Learn

Earn and Learn is a debt reduction program for library users 18 and under. Established in 2012, the program includes frequent communication with families, loan limits, and the waiving of fees for lost and damaged materials. Back in the olden days, we used tracking cards that school library staff kept at the desk. Students had to show the books when they returned them and staff would mark the cards. Thanks to Beanstack, that tracking and monitoring is now done in the cloud. Students will be able to login (or sign up for) their Beanstack accounts and track minutes online or in an app.

This program is available at school only to Shared System students! The message we hope school libraries convey is about responsible use of library materials.

We share library materials with everyone in this whole school, and with the whole city.

When we lose a book, CD or DVD, that means someone else in our school or city can’t use it.
What is enough? We should always have a backup book, but how many more things do we need to have checked out? Taking out just enough makes it easier for us to keep track of our stuff and stay debt‐free!

If you have students who have fees of more than $10.00, you can offer them a chance to read down their fees and ask them to track their reading minutes in Beanstack. The goal is to read 1,200 minutes (20 hours). At each interval of 300 minutes (five hours), you and the Library (depending on where the debt came from) will reduce participants’ fees by 25 percent.

How You can Participate:

To find out who is eligible at your school, use the Find Tool in Leap to Find Patrons.

Choose Account Charges and put in the range of debt to look for, perhaps $5.00 to $1,000.
Use the filter to choose your library as the Patron’s Registered Library.
Add a second filter to include only patrons whose cards expire after today through ten years from now.
Click the magnifying glass to see the list.
Sort by Patron Code to see who is already in Earn and Learn.

You may also see the debt as students check out. You may choose to waive fees at YOUR location, but not at IndyPL locations. For example, you might want to waive a $5.00 lost book fee from a book owned by your schools from five years ago.

High school students are “strongly encouraged” to participate as the opportunity to waive debt disappears at 18.

Students may register at school or at the public library. Both sides are asked not to change registration in Earn and Learn (Patron Code Earn and Learn) without consultation once a student registers. During the summer, public library staff will register students. During the school year, Shared System library managers will encourage students to register.

Library manager reviews current debt and approaches students and their families to invite them to participate. The benefits to students and their families should be apparent!

The library manager changes the account of the child from the current Patron Code to EARN AND LEARN.

If your loan limit is less than 10, use your loan limit. Be aware that if a student goes to a public library branch, they may exceed your loan limit AND THAT’S OK.
Participants are allowed to check out any book materials including juvenile, teen or adult.
Participants are also allowed to check out CDs and audiobooks as part of their 10 items.
Student participants may not check out DVDS. Managers may choose to enforce the universal policy, or approach it on a case-by-case basis (for example, allowing circulation of nonfiction DVDS to support curriculum)

The 10-item loan limit and restriction from DVD check outs remain in effect until students have completed the one-year program. Otherwise, participants have full library privileges including card holder computer time and book requests.

Branch library circ supervisors and school library managers will notify each other or the Shared System office when milestones are reached. To make it simple, each is responsible for waiving ONLY the debt incurred at their location. Even though you will see public library debt, it will be more consistent to allow each side responsibility for their own debt.

Please feel free to experiment with this at your school. You might use it with lower grade students who need the extra help, or with upper grade students who take longer to finish their books! Students should receive date due slips and verbal reminders when they check out.

Note that if their debt rises, it still is reduced by the respective percentages.
Please do not allow siblings, friends or family to accrue points for the student.
The EARN AND LEARN participant remains in the program with a 10-item limit, no DVDs, until a full year elapses, even after they reach 600 points and have a debt free library card.
When one year has expired, you can renew their card as a juvenile patron and restore their full borrowing privileges.

Communication with Families

Schools should send home a flyer with a note so families know their student is in the program. It might be helpful to send this home with a printout of the student’s account showing the amount of debt and including the list of lost materials.
When you see a student has read off all their debt, celebrate! To add emphasis, ask your principal to send a congratulatory note. School library managers may draft the letter and prepare it. .
School libraries might include promotional information in parent packets at the beginning of the year and keep a supply on hand for transfers and for those who don’t read everything in their packets!

Opening an account in Beanstack

beanstack_qr_code and directions Download

Find out whether the student has a Beanstack account
- if yes, ask the student to login
  - Ask student to click button that says “Challenge Code”
  - Provide the student with the challenge code available from SharedSystem@indypl.org.
  - Student enters the challenge code.
  - The program will open as a popup.
  - Click the button at the bottom right corner that says “Join Challenge” to join the challenge.
- if no, and the student is 12 and under, send home the flyer which tells them about Earn and Learn and the infographic about how to register for a Beanstack account.
- if no, and the student is 13 and over, ask the student to create a Beanstack account, then return to first step
Student records reading minutes in Beanstack (see flyer for details)
- Student receives an email from Beanstack when 300 minute intervals are reached. (Goal is 1,200 minutes.)
- If student owes money to your location, open the patron record and waive 25 percent of the student’s fees
- Notify sharedsystem@indypl.org when you have waived fees, and/or if fees are owed to IndyPL. Kimberly and Sarah will waive IndyPL fees in Polaris and note on the student’s record in Beanstack that they have received the indicated “reward” for the Earn and Learn challenge.
Use your judgment! If a student signs up today and tells you tomorrow they have finished the challenge, you should be skeptical!