Questions
Answers
| What do I need to do to get the staff
room ready?
|
Before your staff ever walks in the door, look over
your staff room and take inventory of the items already present: computer
equipment, camera supplies, film, paper, tools and teaching resources.
Make a list of what you'll need to purchase or order.
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| How about organizing the staff room
space?
|
Clearly, the more space the better. You'll want enough
physical space for students to work comfortably without colliding into
one another. Try to divide the workspace into separate functional areas:
a computer area, a space for reviewing photos and cropping, another
space for handling marketing and finances. Some staffs get by with surprisingly
little room, even sharing workspaces with other school groups or classes,
moving around like nomads as necessary.
Try to give the senior staff members (or the students you rely on most)
their own dedicated areas. They'll work harder if they feel ownership
in both the book and in their physical spaces. If nothing else, establish
safe storage spaces for their materials and records, a mailbox and maybe
a bulletin board to decorate and use.
Take a look at Taylor’s SAM curriculum for more information on
this topic.
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| What basic materials do I need?
|
Taylor will provide most of the essentials in your kit
of supplies (called the GearKit). But you'll need to pick up a few other
items:
| • |
Basic office supplies: calculator, scissors,
tape, pens, pencils, markers, rulers, notepads. |
| • |
A phone if possible. You'll use it for interviews, ad
calls and contacts with your sales representative and Taylor's customer
support personnel. Be sure your contacts know the best (and worst)
times to call you. Also, keep a phone message log book near the
telephone to keep track of missed calls. |
| • |
Access to a fax machine will help. Give this number to
your representative and account executive (AE). An e-mail address
is another invaluable tool for communicating with Taylor or your
staff. |
| • |
A small light table can be helpful when examining negatives,
slides and doing paste-up work. |
| • |
A lock box. Have a safe place to keep petty cash and
checks for yearbook orders. Lock it, then stow it away. |
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| What materials does Taylor provide?
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At a time specified by your representative, Taylor ships
a box of essential supplies called the GearKit. The items in your kit
vary from year to year as Taylor makes changes to better serve our customers.
The specific items also depend on your chosen production method (i.e.
Taylor's Vision Series, PageMaker/QuarkXPress or InDesign) and book
trim size. The trim size is simply the final cut size of your yearbook
pages:
| • |
7 3/4" X 10 1/2" |
| • |
8 1/2" X 11" |
| • |
9" X 12" |
In general, you will receive the
following items in your GearKit:
Adviser's tools:
| • |
Layout binder - A large three-ring binder used to
hold copies of completed pages, rough drafts and computer printouts. |
| • |
Adviser portfolio - Your personal notebook for storing lots of
information pertaining to your book. |
Planning tools:
| • |
Large ladder diagram - A wall diagram for listing
all of the pages of your yearbook, plus page deadlines, color pages
and who is responsible for the pages. |
| • |
Mini-ladder diagram book. |
Publications:
| • |
The Yearbook Yearbook - An annual publication
showcasing exceptional Taylor yearbooks from across the country.
The publication displays outstanding examples of cover design, theme
development and layout from middle school, high school and college
yearbooks. |
| • |
The Ultimate Art Book - Clip art pages |
Production tools:
| • |
Cropper Classic (with instructions) - This is a
tool for cropping photos and determining the proportionality of
picture areas. |
| • |
Cropping pencils - These grease pencils are required for placing
crop marks on photos. They're necessary for cropping because the
marks can be removed if needed without hurting the image. |
| • |
Mounting boards - Use these boards for mounting school-provided
art and collages. |
| • |
Cover art board - Use this board for mounting artwork if you
choose to do a custom yearbook cover. |
| • |
Endsheet art boards - These boards are for mounting artwork on
school-designed endsheets. |
| • |
Rulers - These plastic rulers are for measuring type, rule lines
and pictures. They also serve as a useful straight edge for designing
layouts on paper. |
| • |
Blank picture label sheets - Use these stickers to label each
photo you submit. Usually, your labels will have your five-digit
customer number pre-printed on them. |
Shipping tools:
| • |
Copy shipping records - You'll use these three-part
forms to record the pages included in each shipment you send to
the plant. |
| • |
Copy shipping envelopes - These green-and-white envelopes are
reserved for mailing pages to the plant. |
| • |
Account Executive special attention envelopes - Use these pre-addressed
envelopes for shipping items directly to your plant account executive.
Because so much material arrives at Taylor each day, always send
any material that needs your AE's attention with his or her name
indicated on the envelope. |
| • |
Expandable shipping envelopes - These green-and-white accordion-fold
envelopes are for larger copy shipments, especially portrait pages. |
Miscellaneous:
| • |
Plastic yearbook cover sample - Plastic covers help
protect the yearbook's exterior for years to come. They're also
a great way to earn additional revenue for the yearbook. The sample
includes an order form. |
| • |
Supply order form - This form lists the staff room and darkroom
supplies available for purchase from Taylor Publishing. You can
also call the Supply Desk at 800-947-0401 or order online at tayloryearbooks.com. |
Marketing Supplies:
| • |
Receipt books - Use these receipt books to keep
track of yearbook sales. |
| • |
SumIt - Taylor’s easy-to-use sales tracking software. Set
up your pricing schedule, import a list of student names, then track
sales of the yearbook or any yearbook options you make available
for sale with your publication. |
| • |
Names-on-cover forms - To request personalized covers, just type
the information and submit this form to your account executive by:
December 15 for Spring delivery books, and April 1 for Summer/Fall
delivery books. |
| • |
Ad Contracts - Two-part NCR (No Carbon Required) form for each
ad purchased. |
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Collection envelope - Envelope to collect and record sales income. |
| • |
Sales promotional materials - You may receive items such as posters,
parent mailers and flyers in your kit or as a separate mailing from
Taylor. These materials may change a lot from year to year, so be
on the lookout for these or ask your representative what's new. |
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| I'm new to yearbook advising. Does
Taylor provide any items specifically for new advisers?
|
Yes, new Taylor customers and new advisers receive additional
resources that lay a foundation for successful advising.
First, take a deep breath and don't feel you need to know everything
the first day, or any day for that matter. Just make sure your kids
learn as you do. Expect a lot from them, and let them know you do. Remember,
it's their book. It shouldn't be your job to do the book for them. You're
their adviser. So focus on advising -- not doing the work.
A good place to start is with Taylor’s New Adviser’s Guide
to the Yearbook. It’s easy-to-read format has no-frills advice
from veteran advisers on what to concentrate on to ensure your critical
first year goes smoothly.
For middle school advisers, The Jr. High Quickstart is a colorful and
entertaining educational resource for teaching middle school students
the fundamentals of yearbook work. It's packed with visual examples
and includes class activities that help students master basic skills.
You'll also receive some important marketing resources that give comprehensive
help on budgeting, merchandising, advertising, fund-raising and public
relations. They include sample letters and forms that can be photocopied
to aid you in your marketing efforts.
Another marketing resource is the Yearbook Marketing and Resource
Guide.
This publication covers budgeting, merchandising, advertising, fund-raising
and public relations. This extensive list of ideas prepares you for
money-making projects to sell your book.
SAM™, Taylor’s acclaimed journalism curriculum, is chock
full of ready-to-go lesson plans and multimedia resources for you to
use. The modular format of the materials is flexible enough to use with
individual students, small groups or an entire class.
Along with the many educational publications Taylor Publishing offers
to new advisers, we also offer Summer Adviser
Development Seminars.
These seminars train advisers on how to make a great yearbook better
and also how to work with their staff. Technology and classroom training
sessions are also offered for certification. To top it all off, trainers
at these seminars are award-winning yearbook advisers.
You can order these resource books online or through the supply desk
at 1-800-947-0401.
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| How do I go about actually producing
my pages? What tools will I use?
|
With Taylor, you have a number of options regarding
the way you prepare and submit your pages. Whatever production method
you choose, you'll need tools from Taylor specific to that method. That's
why the items in your GearKit will be different than other schools.
Here are the most common approaches to producing pages:
Vision Series Software
In 1983, Taylor introduced the first yearbook creation software with
its unique Vision Series. Today, that software has matured substantially.
Taylor’s Vision Series is a group of desktop publishing programs
that are yearbook-specific and easy to use. The Vision Series can be
mastered quickly with little or no technical knowledge. They come with
fonts, page design tools, built-in text editing and special indexing
features. Unlike any other desktop software, it can even fit your copy
automatically when space is limited. Taylor provides toll-free support,
on-line help and a variety of training options. The Vision Series is
a great choice for staffs focused on productivity and ease of use,
and for staffs with limited computer resources.
YB!Pro (PostScript disk-submission)
For staffs that want a high degree of page control, Taylor’s
YB!Pro is a powerful option.
You can use Adobe PageMaker, InDesign or QuarkXPress to design and
then submit your pages on disk. Taylor supports you with technical
assistance and quality PostScript output, but the bulk of your page
preparation is in your hands. (PostScript, by the way, simply refers
to the electronic page description language used to output desktop
layouts to film.)
You'll have a lot of creative flexibility; you can use a wide variety
of fonts, scan your own art and photos, and integrate graphics from
programs like Photoshop, FreeHand and Illustrator. You'll also be training
students to work with programs they can use well beyond the yearbook.
Since your pages will come to Taylor electronically on disks (or large-capacity
media such as Zips™ or CDs), your pages must be error-free and
ready to run. You'll need some technical knowledge to avoid computer
hang-ups, though some are probably inevitable.
Also, be certain you have enough computer power and other hardware,
such as scanners, laser printers and digital cameras to handle the
workload. Your Taylor representative can help you assess all of these
issues.
PDF Submission
A variation on YB!Pro (above), Taylor also offers support for submitting
plate-ready PDF files. To submit PDFs, all page elements must be in
place, links checked, resolution and color definitions OK so the page
is ready to image. This option is not for the faint of heart, but
offers complete control because your submitted PDF is completely paginated
and imaged just as you see it before submission. Highly-compressed,
print-ready PDF files are increasingly being adopted by commercial
printers nationwide. Consult your Taylor Representative or Taylor’s
Tech Support Team for more information on how to configure Adobe Acrobat’s
Distiller to create PDFs suitable for output at Taylor.
On-Line Submission
Using Taylor’s YB!Pro plug-in, you can submit your 100%-digital
pages over the internet through our FTP server. No mail, no hassles!
In order to submit pages on-line, pages must be prepared in Adobe PageMaker,
InDesign or QuarkXPress with all digital images and artwork in place.
A high-speed internet connection is also required. Consult your Taylor
Representative or Taylor’s Tech Support Team for more information
on submitting pages on-line.
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| How do I order supplies?
|
Taylor supplies can be ordered from Taylor's supply
by calling toll-free: 800-947-0401, or you can order
online by clicking here.
For the fastest service, try to have the item number for what you're
ordering. It's a small four-digit number printed on just about everything
that comes from Taylor. Your Account Executive can also help fulfill
orders for some kinds of supplies. Many items have no charge, others
have a minimal cost. Any costs for supply items or shipping charges
will be billed directly to your Taylor account. Feel free to ask about
the cost of any item you order.
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| What kinds of Taylor support services
are available?
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Your Sales Representative
Your Taylor sales representative is your most important source of support,
information and guidance. He or she will help you establish your yearbook
specifications, production deadlines and staff goals. Taylor representatives
are trained to listen well and work hard for you, so feel free to discuss
any yearbook questions or concerns.
Your representative will schedule staff visits throughout the year.
Make sure these visits are timed to accomplish specific goals (i.e.,
proofing pages, planning the cover, launching your marketing campaign).
Among your first priorities is to review your contract. Prepare a list
of questions before your representative arrives. Remember, the more
questions you have answered in the beginning, the smoother your book
will progress.
Click here to locate your local Sales
Representative
During the meeting, be prepared to:
| • |
Review your production method and adjust
it, if necessary. |
| • |
Discuss your yearbook budget, book price, fund-raising,
funds available or outstanding debts. |
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Establish copy submission and deadline dates. |
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Ask about new products, materials and review kit items. |
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Go over delivery expectations. |
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Exchange telephone numbers, email addresses, fax numbers
and best times to call. |
| • |
Set up your next appointment. |
Account Executive
Your account executive (AE) at the plant tracks the progress of your
pages through the copy preparation, printing, and cover and binding
areas. This in-plant person will handle correspondence and communication
for any questions or problems that may arise while your pages are in
production.
Your AE and Taylor's Customer Service staff are available 8:00 a.m.
to 4:30 p.m. weekdays (Central Time for Dallas, Mountain Time for El
Paso), and 8 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. Central Time in San Angelo (Newsfoto)
to assist you with almost any aspect of your publication.
Each AE has a personal toll-free line for you to use. Your representative
can supply that number if you don't have it. Account executives work
in teams, so if your AE is unavailable when you call, feel free to
ask for another team member to help. Get to know your AE -- they're
all great people!
You can also call anytime, day or night, and leave a voice-mail message
for either your AE or sales representative. It's a terrific way to
leave questions or respond to one left by your AE or sales representative.
Simply dial your AE's toll-free number or Taylor's main voice-mail
number: 800-677-2810. Be sure to leave complete information with your
message, including your customer number and the phone number with area
code if you need a call back.
Each AE and most Taylor sales representatives will also be available
by email.
Vision Technical Support
Vision Software Support specialists answer technical questions
regarding Vision Series software. The staff is trained in
both yearbook preparation and computer operations to help
you find solutions to your problems. Their toll-free number
is 800-521-4672.
When you call, it's important to have the following information:
| • |
Your customer number |
| • |
Your computer make(s) and processor types |
| • |
The version number of your Vision software |
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The type of printer you are using |
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Any on-screen error messages |
The person calling should be knowledgeable about the problem, and
if possible, have the phone near the computer so we can step you through
the solution.
Click here to contact Vision Support
YB!Pro Technical Support
Taylor's YB!Pro team answers technical questions concerning YB!Pro
disk submission and paste-up production. Support is available for users
of Adobe PageMaker, QuarkXPress, Macromedia FreeHand, Adobe Illustrator
and Adobe Photoshop. Digital Source Support can assist both Windows
and Macintosh users with software and hardware problems. Digital Source
support can be reached at 800-947-0510.
When you call, it's important to have the following information:
| • |
Your customer number |
| • |
Your computer make(s) and processor types |
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The version number of your software |
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The type of printer you are using |
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If an error message appeared, note it precisely |
Click here to contact YB!Pro Support
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| How does Taylor keep track of my yearbook
materials?
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A five-digit customer number is assigned to every school
that works with Taylor. This number is the key to tracking items associated
with your yearbook so it must appear on anything you send to the plant
(pictures, page layouts, disks, artwork, or even a letter to your AE).
Without that number, your materials can get misplaced in the hundreds
of thousands of materials flowing through Taylor's facilities. Make
sure every staff member knows the number by heart.
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| What are Yearbook Specifications
and Deadlines forms (Specs)?
|
During the production of your yearbook, you will receive
Yearbook Specifications and Deadlines forms, sometimes referred to as "Specs." Each
Spec reflects some modification of the original yearbook specifications
and should be reviewed in its entirety. Each changed item on your spec
will be annotated with an asterisk (*).
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| Are meetings important to the
production of the yearbook?
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Meetings are extremely important not only to the production
of the yearbook but also for the morale of your staff. It's a time for
staff members to get together and discuss deadlines, problems and brainstorm
ideas. Most importantly, it's a time when students can feel like a team
and get a sense that everyone is working toward a common goal: a great
yearbook! It's important to start meetings at the beginning of the year
and keep meetings consistently scheduled. The following are sample agendas
for your first three meetings.
First Meeting
| • |
After taking attendance, welcome new and
old members to the staff. Let them know their jobs will be important
and fun. |
| • |
Discuss the possible use of theme and/or graphic treatment.
The sooner your staff decides on using a theme and/or graphic treatment,
the sooner you can begin working on your first deadline. Give the
staff a time limit. After encouraging students to brainstorm, narrow
their choices to three. If they are unable to vote on one during
this meeting, be sure to stress that a final vote will be taken
at the next meeting. |
| • |
Review the staff meeting schedule, attendance and grading
policy, if applicable. |
| • |
Review unfilled staff positions. Distribute application
forms so staff members can apply for those positions. |
| • |
Set a date and time for the next meeting. |
Second Meeting
| • |
After taking attendance, review theme choices
from the last meeting and vote to determine the winning theme. |
| • |
Discuss the cover design/graphic. Give everyone an assignment
to bring their ideas to the next meeting. |
| • |
Work on the ladder diagram. The ladder diagram dictates
what work must be completed. Without it, students become frustrated
with no direction and worse, deadline commitments become difficult
or impossible to meet. |
| • |
Set a date and time for the next meeting. |
Third Meeting
| • |
After taking attendance, vote on the cover
design. If needed, the winning design can be touched up by the school
art department or an in-plant Taylor artist. And if time, money
and/or creativity are limited, you may pick from the wide range
of Taylor designed-covers. Your representative can provide you with
samples. |
| • |
Review adviser-set deadlines. |
| • |
Assign staff positions, if not already assigned. |
| • |
Distribute and review a production schedule. The production
schedule should be filled out after the ladder diagram is completed.
The schedule is used to assign pages and coordinate deadlines. |
| • |
An organizational tip is to provide each staff member
with a style manual that includes specifics surrounding your yearbook:
fonts, staff member contact information, sections, deadlines and
page numbers, point size to be used, and important phone numbers
should be included. |
| • |
Assign pages to staffers from the production schedule. |
| • |
Set a date and time for the next meeting. |
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