Background Information:

About a year to year and a half ago, TPT let sellers know about a new program called TPT School Access. The School can purchase an account and gives the teachers credit, so the teachers don’t have to pay for resources.

 

A few restrictions with the program:

  • Only allow resources up to $15 to be included.
  • Only get resources for a year – in TPT School Access, the products are rented for a year
    1. Teachers can download the resources, but if they forget, after a year the resource is gone.
    2. Many teachers use their TPT account like a digital storage. So, if they don’t download the resource, after a year, it’s no longer in their downloads file.

 

When this was first explained, we opted out.

  • Not fond of the rental of resources, the limit on the dollar amount of resources, and we can’t see what the portal looks like. There is no way for us to see what our store would look like on TPT School Access.
  • TPT keeps about 40% of the sales, in addition, for Boom items, we have to pay a fee on top of that.
  • Also, thought this would be a project that TPT would abandon. Many times, they have projects they start and abandon later.

 

New Information:

Chose to Opt-In to the School Access when asked again, because:

  • It looks like TPT is committed to School Access for at least another year to year and a half.
  • I really want teachers to access our resources without paying for them.

 

I’m not sure exactly when we will be opted in. It should show on the dashboard when we are opted in. Believe we can opt out later if we want.

 

Questions:

Sharing this information with you because we may get questions in the future.

 

  • A teacher purchased a resource and now it’s gone, where is it?
    1. We don’t know where the teacher purchased the resource from. If they don’t specify it’s from our Shopify Store, TPT, TPT School Access, etc. We have no way of knowing.
  • Teachers may not differentiate between School Access and TPT as a whole, when they have questions with resources.

 

  • If someone is asking, and they specifically mention TPT School Access, we want to immediately refer them back to TPT.
    1. We are not equipped to help with School Access, because we don’t know what the platform looks like.
    2. Since TPT is getting 40% of the price of the resource to TPT, then they should absorb the responsibility of the tech and the question side of it.
    3. If someone specifically asks about School Access, please refer them back to TPT support.

 

If you have questions, please let me know. Also, keep me updated if you have a lot of concerns or issues.

 

End of the day, the decision was made because I want to contribute so teachers don’t have to pay for resources. If this becomes a hassle for us, we can opt out. Just keep me updated.

 

-Alison

 

January 2021