Economic impact of the rational use of paper in assessments at a school in Barueri, SP

Educational institutions are large consumers of paper in their activities. Schools are interested in reducing its use due to environmental and economic concerns, as waste is costly. One strategy for reducing use is to make changes in the formatting and printing of documents. The objective of this work was to analyze the economic impact of the use of sulfite paper in quarterly and semester assessments, with the mandatory double-sided printing and standard formatting (Times New Roman 12 font and two-column text), in a public educational institution in the municipality of Barueri, São Paulo state. With this requirement, there was a saving of 17,536 sheets of sulfite paper, and with this the institution saved R$ 1,363.86, therefore there was a cost reduction of 55.85% when compared to printing only on one side of the paper. The savings generated allowed the implementation of cards for correcting assessments, at no cost to the institution, for 2.3 school years. A simple change in printing methods, which depends only on printer usage and awareness-raising efforts among the institution's educators, has yielded economic benefits. Beyond the economic and educational impacts, the adopted printing model aligns the institution with current environmental concerns.