SUNY Managed Print Initiative Roll-out FAQ

In 2019 SUNY conducted a comprehensive assessment of the campuses print landscape (print devices, print volume and type, and existing campus managed print contracts) which revealed that SUNY prints more than 50 million pages a month, and possesses more than 40,000 devices, of which approximately 50% are personal or desktop printers. The analysis, conducted by an independent print consultant (Pharos), also determined that SUNY spends approximately $50M per year on printing with color printing accounting for more than 50% of the cost. As a result of this assessment, SUNY established the System-wide Print Resource Use Policy – an initiative that seeks to reduce printing across all SUNY campuses. 

The goals of the SUNY Management Print Initiative is to establish campus goals to reduce the amount of printing and number of printers, but also establish system-wide print defaults and standards; limit printing to items essential for academic instruction or required to perform and complete business needs; achieve sustainability goals to reduce the college’s paper, energy use and carbon footprint; deploy software to monitor usage by individual, application, department, and device; and have campuses centralize their print budgets. The goals are to reduce costs, increase operational efficiencies, and implement secure and sustainable printing practices. Check out the full SUNY Presentation. 

All SUNY campuses are required to participate in the SUNY Managed Print Initiative and demonstrate compliance with the System-wide Print Resource Use Policy. 

In tandem with SUNY’s Print Initiative, SUNY Fredonia will be moving forward with its own initiative on campus where employees will be active participants in the effort to “print smart and print less.” The project, to continue to be led by the Information Technology Services department, began in 2021 and consisted of two phases aimed at achieving print efficiency, optimization and meeting sustainability goals by Summer 2025.

Phase 1 of the project began in the spring of 2021 when IT started to collect printing data to better understand our current fleet of printer hardware and usage. In partnership with our vendor Toshiba, we analyzed the current print environment and determined the age of equipment, types of printers (local versus network), printer utilization and printer locations.  

We are now embarking on Phase II of the project beginning this fall, where we will be working with employees and departments to ensure effective print options while reducing the number of campus printers. Effective solutions will be implemented to move tasks to digital workflows, reducing the need for printing. Per SUNY, USB printers and single-function color printers will be removed, with printers older than seven years removed or replaced. While the print fleet is being reduced, we are working with departments to migrate them over to a new print management solution and training all users. We anticipate the project to be completed by the end of spring 2025.

SUNY Fredonia is rolling out "FREDprint" in response to the SUNY Managed Print Initiative.

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