We are just about finished (finally) with our school directory for this year. For the third year in a row the person that was in charge has dropped the project before it was completed (three different people).
Anyway, our school will not give us electronic data on the students. So we send out a form asking for all the data for each family and input it all. We also ask for email addresses for our email updates.
We use Microsoft word to format the document and this year we were finally able to use last year's format and just update, add, and remove people.
We take the directory to local print shops for bids and then go with the lowest bidder.
We do accept ads for our directory. Some years, when we have an ambitious sales person, we sell a lot of ads. Other years, like this one, we don't sell many. We offer free ads to businesses that give things to us for our Halloween carnival and other fundraisers, and we have been able to barter with our accountant so we give him an ad and he gives us a big discount on our taxes.
Each school in our area does it differently. I wish it was more standardized - I think it could be a good business for someone (Tim, is that why you asked?) to standardize it like the yearbook business.
We've never had problems or negative comments about school directories because we've always had them--they're indispensable. I guess it's a "culture" thing--it's what we're used to and parents don't know any different--there's not even any discussion about it.
Shelly
This has been brought up in the past at our school. The Super. has canned this idea. There are parents out there that don't what their phone numbers to be published on the class lists! So when it snows they're on their own.
