TRANSCRIPT Requesting American Printing House (APH) Products In Texas Using Federal Quota Funds 9/29/25 >>Carrie: Hi. All right. Let me share my screen. So I'm Carrie Gillespie and I am one of the assistive technology consultants in Outreach at TSBVI. And today we are specifically going to be going over the American Printing House for the Blind processes for the State of Texas. So this does not apply to other states, necessarily, because other states do things very differently. The State of Texas has it all organized by the Texas School for the Blind. All the requests for APH items using federal quota funds goes through us at Texas School for the Blind and Visually Impaired. And so I'm going to go over that process. And then there should be time for questions as well. As we go through, go ahead and put them in the chat and at the end there will be some time as well. First of all, the website that is in the chat is the TSBVI American Printing House for the Blind website. So it's specific to Texas School for the Blind. The APH website by itself is a totally different site. But this is the site for Texas School for the Blind that has all of our processes in the State of Texas. And the way you get there is you go to Texas School for the Blind website, state resources, Outreach Services, and American Printing House is one of the links. But you could also just Google TSBVI APH, and it usually is the first one that comes up. That is where all of our information is. That is where all the current information will always be. Any changes to APH or processes, they will always be updated on this website. Okay. So there are a few steps for requesting items. When you request items, it is not ordering items. So the items are being requested go to myself and then another one of my colleagues, Suzanne Slade, which I will give her contact information out at the end. Suzanne processes all of the Fusion requests, as we no longer have JAWS with APH by itself or ZoomText by itself. It is now Fusion in the State of Texas. And she also processes all of the other products that are not high-cost technology. High-cost technology are always going to go through me. There are three different forms on the website that you would fill out according to what it is you're requesting. And I'll explain what the high-cost technology items mean. There's actually specific items that meet that criteria. But before you actually put in a request, the best thing to do is actually go to the APH website, not the Texas School for the Blind APH site. But the actual American Printing House for the Blind website. And this link is on our website. And you want to check to see if the item is actually eligible for quota funds. For purchase with quota funds. You can always purchase items with American Printing House for the Blind outside of federal quota funds. An example of that is sometimes we'll get a request for a student to get like two of the same devices. Because they want to have a Brailler at home and then they want to have a Brailler at school. Unfortunately, we can only approve one of those items. One of the same items. If a school decides that, yes, a student does need this item at home then they usually will have to purchase that item using their own school funds. This is specifically about federal quota funds which are these items are of no cost to the student or of no cost to the school. So you'll always want to make sure first that the item is actually eligible for federal quota funds. So on this page, there is a screenshot of one of the new items. The Neptune. I just received one in the mail that I have not even opened yet to see how this works. But I'm kind of excited about it, so that's why I took a screenshot of it today. And if you look on this screenshot it says "federal quota eligible." And then it says how many are in stock. I know that if I wanted this item for one of my students that it is eligible with federal quota funds. So that's your first step in the process. Okay. The product request form. That is the form for all items that are not Fusion licenses or high-cost technology items. So all of your other materials. All of those other materials, even though they may not seem like consumables, we condition them consumables. I'll explain what that means in a little while. So on this request form -- and I'm going to pull it up in a second -- you can request ten catalog products perform in quantities of ten or fewer. So if you are ordering more than ten items or more than ten of an item, then you have to complete multiple forms for your student. You also need to complete a different form for each district or charter school or whatever school it is that you are purchasing for. You cannot order an item for if you work with multiple school districts for one school district and another school district on the same form. They have to be separate. Because we will organize it by districts and track, for our purposes and for auditing purposes, so we know where our items are going. Okay. Let me show you where that form is. So this is the Texas School for the Blind TSBVI website on this page. It has information what are federal quota funds. They are an annual federal allotment basically for students who are blind, visually impaired, or Deafblind in the United States. Texas puts it all into one big fund and manages it and distributes the different items. Other states do it differently. Some states have actually distributed it to the districts. That is not how Texas does it. So sometimes people will be like how much money do I have left? Even though the allotment comes from the per student, it's not necessarily divided per student. Because you may need a high-cost item for a student this year and you may not need something for them next year. But maybe the near after you need some more items for that student. So it's in a big pot, essentially, that we distribute out as the requests come in. What we ask for is that you only request what you actually need. We don't want items being requested and purchased and sitting in a closet not for student use. Because when that happens, then we end up getting to a point where we can run out of funds for the year. Which we have gotten different grants and different things to try to supplement that deficit at different times, but all we ask is that you actually need the items that you are requesting for your students so that they are not just sitting in a closet. Okay? Sorry. I'm -- my throat. Okay. So the APH product request form -- I'm going to show you that. It's kind of small. Hold on. Okay. So this form will request your e-mail. And you can do ten items per -- I'm not going to go through the whole thing -- perform. But I'm going to show you what the next page looks like real quick. So it will ask the contact information, the district. That's really important. Or the school. The address. One thing that's important with these addresses is that we cannot ship to -- or APH cannot ship to PO boxes and we also cannot ship to home addresses. A lot of times TVIs that work with multiple schools and districts want to ship things to their home because it's easier and they make sure they get the product. Unfortunately, we cannot do that, especially high-cost items, we check those addresses. And if it looks like a home and not a school entity or an educational institution or a co-op or something like that, then we are going to have to ask for another address of the school to be able to process that request. So it's really important that you don't put your home address in that request box and that we cannot do it -- send items to PO boxes. City, ZIP code -- oh, yeah. It's going to make me do all of that. I'm not going to be able to get to the page that's going to show me the items but there will be a point where you put in the item. You put in the item number, so that we make sure that the item number is actually what you're requesting. In the past, if people have put in the wrong item number, there's so many items with American Printing House that it's easy to make a mistake, especially with some of the paper items. If you don't have the correct item number, there's a chance that the wrong item can be ordered. Try to be accurate with the item number and try to be accurate also with the price of the item. So that's for the regular items. The Fusion -- let me see if there's anything I missed on the regular product. I think I already explained that. Yeah. One form per district or charter school. Make sure that the item is not discontinued. Make sure you type in the correct name and catalog number. And then make sure the materials get shipped to a school or an educational institution of some kind. A lot of people -- and I don't believe they're going to be doing paper catalogs, at least very many of them anymore. So it's always best to look online on the APH site to see what the actual cost of the current item is. Because that's really important for us to process what we're spending. In that spreadsheet, that's how we track what money we spent and where we spent the money. So try to be as accurate as possible with that information. All right. The Fusion license request. So Fusion, if you don't know, is the combining of ZoomText and JAWS into one license. Even if your student only uses the ZoomText component of it, they will still have that JAWS as an option with the software. That's part of it. They just don't need to use the JAWS if that's not something they use. And vice versa. So Texas is only going to be doing Fusion items with federal quota funds. And you're going to complete that form with all your Fusion license requests. It's pretty fast to order those. Although, you need to make sure that you do it ahead of time of when that license is going to expire so that your students do not have a lag in their license. Okay? And just like with the regular product request form, you must submit a separate form for each district or charter school. So let me show you that form real quick. >>Kaycee: Carrie, this is Kaycee, we had a great question come in the chat. For those that submit for multiple districts, can they have everything shipped to the district where their home base office is? >>Carrie: No. Unfortunately -- well, if you work for a co-op or something, that's fine. But you can't ship one item -- if you work for a co-op or something and that's where you have things shipped to for you for all of your students, that is okay. However, you can't have one item shipped to one district when the item really is supposed to be for another district. I hope that answers that question. I know it's kind of tedious to have to do multiple forms, but this is for auditing purposes. We really need to know where these items are located. Where they've been shipped to, what district has it, has used some of the funding for it. So hopefully that answers that question. Is there any more questions? >>Kaycee: No. Thank you. >>Carrie: Okay. So the next Fusion -- again, these forms are all on this website. So this is a Fusion license request form. Again, it will ask for your e-mail. Please be sure you type your e-mail in correctly. I sometimes will get e-mails that jump back to me when I am sending out information. So then if that is the case, if it's not a current e-mail, then the order will be canceled by us because there would be no way for us to contact you to get that information. Please be accurate in your e-mail. First name, last name, district, charter school. City, ZIP code. And then for the Fusion licenses, it's a pull-down. So you only put Fusion Suite. If you need multiple of them, you can do up to ten. So if you have ten students that are in need of Fusion updated license, then you can do them all in one order or in one request. And then the price is the same. I don't know -- I don't think the prices changed recently but I'll double check and make sure that's the correct price. So that is the Fusion request form. Leave that site. Okay. Let me go back to my -- and then make sure again. Same thing like the product, that it's a separate form for each district or charter school. Okay. This is where it's a little bit more in depth, the high-cost technology request form. So this form is for requesting high-cost technology items such as specialized assistive technology. And it specifically says high-cost technology because we do understand that there are high-cost items with APH such as certain kits that are expensive. Over $1,000. So you would think, hmm, that's probably a high-cost item too. However, those are still in the regular product requests. The items that we request that you send back to us are the ones that we are considering high-cost technology. And so this is the form that you would use for that. Quota funds are not available yet for purchasing the Monarch in Texas. This is still true. However, at the end of my presentation, I will have a small update on the Monarch grant that the State of Texas is doing. And if you are going to be part of that grant, you have probably already been notified for any of your students. So the difference between this and the other product in Fusion is that you must submit one form per high-cost technology item per student. So if your student is in need of a Juno and you also want them to have a Jupiter for regular classroom use. But the Juno for more portable. You have to complete two separate forms and requests for those two items, okay? And, again, you cannot request two of the same items. Or if you do, we're just going to send you an e-mail saying I'm so sorry. We are only able to purchase one of these items. However, the school is able to use their own funding to purchase those items directly from American Printing House. Okay? So just because you can't use federal quota funds for some of those purposes, does not mean you cannot order directly from American Printing House. Anybody is welcome to order from them directly. After submitting the form, a TSBVI outreach consultant, such as myself, typically I'm the one who does the high-cost technology forms, will send a follow-up e-mail. And basically the e-mail says you have -- we have received your request. However, we need to have you complete this justification form so that we can further process your request. The APH high-cost technology justification form is basically our documentation that shows that this item is definitely needed for the student. If we ever have to go back and see if an item actually was, you know, what the purpose of that item was. We have that documentation. If you don't do that second part of the request, then that request will eventually be canceled. So please, please, please make sure you fill out that high-cost technology justification form when you receive that e-mail from me, Carrie Gillespie. It's going to always be from me, for at least right now. I guess if there ever were a situation that it wouldn't be from me, it would be from another Outreach consultant at TSBVI. So let me show you that form. Okay. So that's the high-cost technology request form. This has all the same information as the other ones did, which is the charter school, the district, school. But this time it's asking for student name. The reason we ask for student name is we need to double check and make sure that your student is on the VI Registry. If a student has moved and they were on the registry before, we're still going to find them if they were on the registry, even if they're in a different district now. This is how a student qualifies for federal quota funds. So that's one of the reasons that it's really important that you guys do your registry every year for your VI students. Okay? We will not ask for student information in an e-mail. Please do not put student information in e-mails to us. We don't want any identifying information that's going through e-mail about students. This form is secure and then we will have that information in a spreadsheet at TSBVI to be able to look up that student on the registry to make sure they are eligible. We do ask for grade of the student as well, just to help us is this appropriate for this student. Sometimes a kindergarten student may not need a really robust device so we're going to want to question that and be is this student ready for this type of device? Okay? And then in the pull-down, this has all the high-cost technology items listed with their item number. And then I'm going to show you where you're going to add the price in yourself, because these change. So we didn't want to put in a price in the spreadsheet when the prices can change. So that would be, even though you wouldn't think of it, the APH Light Touch Perkins Brailler. APH SMART Brailler by Perkins. A Chameleon 20. The Juno, which is a portable magnifier. Jupiter, which is a CCTV. A Mantis Q40, which is a Braille display. The MATT Connect. The full piece of equipment. And then we also have tablet only, because sometimes the people have only needed a new tablet if the other one was damaged or broken. The Neptune is that item I mentioned briefly. Again, I don't know all that it does yet but it's a reader. It's an OCR reader, from what I understand. And then Pageblaster and Pixblaster. Sorry. Oh, and also the Polly. I forgot about the Polly is on there. So these are the only items that you need to use this form for. Even if you think something is kind of expensive, it's these specific items that you need to use this form for. These are also the specific items that if a student is no longer using one of these types of devices at your school and you have them sitting around, then we want you to return them back to TSBVI. And I'll go through that process in a second. So these are the ones that we want back. We do not want all of the other consumables being sent back to our warehouse anymore because that was creating a lot of packages that we never were able to open. And those items can be used -- some people are like what do we do with them? You can donate them to other regions. You can donate them to parents or students -- not the high-cost items, but other consumable items. You can share, as needed, those APH items. But the high-cost technology items that you are no longer using, we need returned when you are no longer needing them. Okay. This form also, at the very bottom, asks for the price. Again, please go to the APH website. It's linked on this form. And look up the current price of that item. That is the high cost technology form. And, again, I have them listed on here. They are not listed on the website but they are listed on the form. All right. It's important. Ensure that your item is not discontinued. Items need to be for student use, not for tech loans or for staff. The especially high cost, I check the VI Registry to make sure that the student is on there. If the student is not on there, I will contact you and let you know. This is kind of a gray area. If there are devices at the school for them to use temporarily, sometimes we have a tech loan that they can use until they get on that registry to get their own devices. And then, again, materials must be shipped to a school or a school entity, not a home address. Or a PO Box. And then, again, just want to reinforce that schools are always able to purchase items directly through American Printing House that are not with federal quota funds. If they need additional items. All right. Repairs. So Suzanne Slade is the one that does all the regular products and Fusion licenses and she also handles repairs. So if you have a broken device and you're like I don't know what to do. I can't get it to work. Contact Suzanne and she will work with you on what to do with that item to try to get it repaired. If it's broken and you don't need another item, then you just need to fill out the return form. Explain in the return form -- that I'll show you in a little bit -- that it is broken. This is what's wrong with it. The screen no longer works. Whatever it is. The more information, the better, if you have a broken item. Okay? If we do not have a working device or Brailler available, you can see if we have one available through the TSBVI tech loan. And that's going to be me. I'm doing the tech loan starting this year. It used to be Donna Clemens but she has a lot of other responsibilities added to her plate so I'm taking on the tech loan this year and going forward. And, again, TSBVI has a website with the tech loan information and for you to put in a request. If those items -- if you have exhausted all of those and you still need a device and the broken device is going to take too long, then at that time you can just request a new device following the APH request process. High-cost technology item. And that will eventually be ordered. We'll have you return the other item and then we will get the item repaired so that in the future we can send it out to somebody else. I did want to mention that even though American Printing House does not have the old Perkins Braillers anymore, we have several at Texas School for the Blind that we are continuing to repair. And so if you request a Brailler from a student -- this is pretty new. We may say are you wanting one of these repaired, older Perkins Braillers instead of the light touch Brailler or SMART Brailler. Just keep that in mind. Suzanne's e-mail is here but it's also on that website. And my e-mail is also on the website. I'll show you -- oops. Did not mean to stop sharing. Hold on. I'll show you the website. I'll go to my website. Am I showing again? >>Kaycee: Yeah. >>Carrie: I stopped sharing for a second. On this website it has on the bottom. It has repair information. Suzanne Slade's information is right there. Oh, right here on the top. High-cost technology and returns. Carrie Gillespie. Let's talk about repairs and returns. So on the bottom of this page is a link that goes to an APH return form and procedures. And this website has all the procedures for returning an item. So at the beginning or end of each school year or any time throughout the year, if an item is no longer needed for a student, please the form. Make sure you have your name, the district, the item that is being returned. The serial number of the item. This is really important. And then if it's in working condition or if it's damaged or broken. Once you submit that form, you will get an e-mail confirmation that the form was submitted. Please print that form and include it inside the package as a packing slip for processing. Okay? Technically, these items that are especially the high-cost technology non-consumable items belong to the State of Texas. And so we need to make sure -- some of these items are very expensive -- that they are able to be tracked. FedEx, UPS, we need to make sure they are tracked. Unfortunately, that cost is incurred by the district, not by Texas School for the Blind. So it's almost like you are borrowing these items for the student in a time period. And then if you do not need them anymore, they need to be shipped back. Sometimes if you're local, they will just bring them to the School for the Blind. Or if they come for different reasons. But those would be shipped to the warehouse, and that address is on that website. And it's also on the form. Let's see. -- >>Kaycee: This is Kaycee. We had another great question come in. Kristin asked what the process is if you have a student that moves in to your district and they are from out of state. Since their name will not be on the registry from the previous year, how they're able to get technology for that student. >>Carrie: Yeah. At this point we'll let you know and we'll communicate back and forth if that student is not in the registry. The biggest issue that has come up with that is that if a student is home schooled and we're still kind of waiting to get clarification on this. But if they're in your school, in a public school setting and we know it's for a student -- it's going to be on an individual basis on whether or not we can loan you an item for the time being. Until that student gets on the registry to purchase. Because we do have tech loan as well. That would probably be our first avenue. The issue comes in when a student is not on the registry and they are home schooled. And the TVI is not necessarily part of a school district or an entity either. Like sometimes we have been finding that more students are getting TVI services from out of state. And that's more of an issue that we're still trying to get clarification on. But for a student in your school system that you are at school with them. You go and you serve them, we'll work things out to hopefully be able to get you a loan until that student can get on the registry. I don't remember the dates of the registry right now off the top of my head. I know it's after the new year sometime. But definitely make sure you get them on it for the following year. Any other questions about that or any other questions? >>Kaycee: The only other question I think you covered. Kathi asked do you request notification if we're having difficulties with a high-cost item? For example, a Juno? >>Carrie: Let me read it myself. Do you request notification if we're having difficulties? Can you clarify is the item damaged? Kathi, I think this came from you. If an item is broken, then you're going to want to reach out to Suzanne Slade and let her know it's broken. We can try to get you a replacement, we will do so. Otherwise you'll have to request another one for replacement. If you're just not knowing how to use it, I guess you can go ahead and reach out to me and I can try to guide you through that. But if you clarify -- and I did not answer your question -- oh, not working consistently. Was about to connect with APH. Reach out to Suzanne Slade so she can see when the item was received. Is it a brand-new item or is it kind of getting older. If it's an older device, it may just be time for a new one. If it's pretty new, it should be under warranty so that's why you should reach out to Suzanne Slade. Okay? All right. Again, I already went through returns, making sure that you print the item and then send it on to the warehouse. Texas Monarch. So a lot of people are like I need a Monarch. Can I request a Monarch? Unfortunately, in Texas, we still do not use -- and some other states may be different -- but we do not use federal quota funds for Monarchs because the cost is just too much. And that would take that money away from students that need other materials. However, this school year we do have a grant. It's called Texas Access Grant and this is a reminder from Donna Clemens. I'm just going to read it because that's pretty much -- she's the one that sent this to me and I don't know if I'll be able to answer your questions but I will do my best. If you have a student that was identified as a primary Braille reader on the 2024 VI census, then your ESC, education region center consultant should have already contacted you with the student names. It says the deadline to complete the roll outreadiness rubric is September 30, 2025 by the end of the day. So apparently you would have received a task to do this rollout readiness rubric and it is due by the end of the day tomorrow. If you think that might be you, if you have been contacted with by your consultant at your ESC, you may double check your e-mails. You could reach out to Donna Clemens. I'm going to read this slowly and I'll put her e-mail in the chat. Clemensd@tsbvi.edu. >>Kaycee: I've got it in the chat for you, Carrie. It's already there. >>Carrie: That is all I know about that grant at this point. Basically if you have been notified that it impacts you -- if you have not been notified, then at this time you are not part of receiving the grant at the moment. I don't know if that means that there will not be other opportunities in the future, I just know this is our first rollout of these devices using the 2024 VI census. So hopefully some of you will get your questions answered soon by the region center or by Donna Clemens. I'm sure there will be some trainings soon in the future. Okay. And then, again, we're going to be super done early unless we have a lot of questions on APH. I know it went kind of fast. I probably could have gone a little slower. But these are basically the instructions for the State of Texas and how we handle it. So if there are a lot more questions to ask, then I'm going to go ahead and ask them now. But if you do have questions, again, my name is Carrie Gillespie at Gillespiec@tsbvi.edu. And then other product requests, Fusion licenses, repairs is Suzanne Slade. It's slades@tsbvi.edu. And I think that that's really it as far as APH in the State of Texas questions. Like I said, we've been trying to streamline our processes over the last year and trying to get them to where orders get done quicker, which is why we've decided some of the roles a little bit more. I try to get back quickly within a day or two, unless I'm out on the road or consulting or doing trainings, you may not hear from me right away with your questions about APH items or requests. But what I do after I order an item with your request, is I will forward you the e-mail from APH. And it will have an item number on there. And that item number -- well, if you are not sure or it's been a week or two, you got that e-mail from me with the item number and you still did not receive it, you can contact APH directly, give them that order number and be like I did not receive this. Could you give me a status on this item? And they can give you the most direct information about whether that item was shipped or not. Okay? There are sometimes where we ship things from us at Texas School for the Blind, if we have the items in stock -- which we did have several new high-cost items this year after the summer that were sent out from Texas School for the Blind. Not from American Printing House. And then we also sometimes will have different products in our warehouse. Paper, joy players, light boxes, things of that nature. There is an occasion that your order might be split, if we have items in our warehouse that we can send out directly from us. And then the rest of the orders might come from APH. Just keep that in mind. Always follow up. I have a teacher reach out recently and asked me about an order back in May. And I had not -- it must not have gone through because he was not on the request form. So if there's ever a time lapse and you don't hear anything, then always follow up. That's what I can say is the best follow-up to make sure that your request actually got submitted correctly so that your students are not without their equipment or materials that they might need. Any more questions? >>Kaycee: This is Kaycee. No other questions have come in at this time but Kathy shared she ordered the Fusion license and it arrived in less than 24 hours. She was excited. >>Carrie: The ones that are a little bit slower, I try to stay on top of the high cost. If you put the request in this week, usually by the end of a week later, like Friday of next week or this week -- like anything that went in last week, by Friday of this week should be at least ordered or at least you've had some sort of contact by me. Again, it depends on what else was going on. And the regular product requests -- because people request a lot -- those are the ones that kind of take a little bit more time. So make sure you put your requests in well before you need them so that you're not waiting on a delay on either the TSBVI end from processing a lot of requests, or on the APH end by there being a lot of orders being put in in a short amount of time. >>Kaycee: Carrie, this is Kaycee. We had a question come in. When you get the Fusion license, it asks for an activation code. Where does one find the activation code? >>Carrie: So it's been a while since I've done Fusion but I believe it's in the e-mail that you receive. Yeah. It should be in the actual e-mail. It would probably take me time to go and find one but usually -- I think you directly get it. When we put in the order, it will ask an e-mail where we want it sent. And then that e-mail goes out to you. And then in that e-mail is the download and then the activation codes. If you don't receive those, then I would reach out to Suzanne Slade and see maybe what happened with your order. But it should be in the confirmation e-mail of the actual license download that you receive. Looking to see if there's any more questions. Okay. Well, I know we're done super early. If you can think of anything else, you're always able to reach out to me directly. Again, Carrie Gillespie. I'll be happy to help you, help answer your questions for your students or just questions about actual devices in determining like what is it that you -- that would meet your kid's needs best. Sometimes people aren't really sure of what the device does and if it's going to meet what the student is actually needing.