Two days a year decide whether your inventory is trustworthy: handout day in August and collection day in June. Every device that leaves without an assignment record on the first, and every device that comes back without being checked against a list on the second, is a device that will show up as "unknown" in an audit eighteen months later.
This is the playbook we use. It is built around one rule: the scan is the record. Nobody writes a serial on a clipboard to type in later, because "later" is where devices disappear.
Before handout day
Get the fleet into one list, keyed by serial. Every device you intend to hand out should already be in inventory with its serial, asset tag, model, and school. If you are starting from a Google Admin export, import it now, not on the day. The free inventory template has the columns if you are on a sheet.
Label every device with a barcode or QR code on the same spot on every unit (I use the lid, top right). A scanner reads a barcode in under a second; a human reads a serial off a bottom sticker in twenty, and gets one character wrong one time in fifty.
Decide the unit of assignment. Students get a device each in a 1:1 program; a shared classroom gets a cart, and the cart holds 30 devices. Both are assignments. Do not hand out a cart's worth of devices to "Room 204" with no cart record, because the first time one migrates to Room 206 you have no way to notice.
Load the roster. If your student information system or Google Directory can feed the roster into inventory, do it, so scanning a student ID (or typing three letters of a name) finds the right person. Edventory syncs the roster from Google Workspace; on a sheet, a lookup against an exported roster works.
Set the condition scale and stick to it: new, good, fair (cosmetic damage), poor (functional damage). The condition at handout is the only defense against a "it was already cracked" conversation in June.
Print the acceptable-use agreement if your district uses one, and decide where the signed copy lives. Tie it to the assignment record (a checkbox "AUP signed" with the date is enough) so you can find it when you need it.
Handout day
Set up stations, each with a scanner, a laptop on the inventory, and a stack of devices. The flow at each station is:
- Scan the device.
- Scan or look up the student.
- Confirm the condition (the device is new or it isn't; if it is a reissued device, note the condition).
- Confirm the AUP is signed.
- Hand it over. The assignment is recorded before the device leaves the table.
A station can do a device every 30 to 40 seconds this way, which is 90 to 120 an hour. Four stations clear a 400-student school in an hour and change. The temptation is to skip the scan when the line is long; that is exactly when devices get lost. If the line is long, add a station, not shortcuts.
At the end of the day, run the exception report: devices scanned out with no student (fix now, while the day is fresh), students on the roster with no device (they were absent; they get one from the reserve, with the same scan), and any device scanned twice.
Edventory's start-of-year workflow is this list as a scan-first checklist: scan device, scan student, condition, done, with the exceptions on a tab. If you are on a spreadsheet, a form with two barcode fields and a condition dropdown, feeding a sheet, is a workable version of the same thing.
During the year: loaners and repairs
The assignments you made in August decay during the year through two doors: repairs and loaners. Keep both doors on the same hinge.
A repair is a ticket linked to the serial. When a student reports a cracked screen, the ticket names the device, the student, the symptom, and the date. A QR label on the device that opens a repair form already linked to that serial means the student files it themselves and you never ask "which one is it." Edventory prints those labels; a Google Form with a serial field works on a sheet.
A loaner is a checkout with a due date. If the student gets a loaner while theirs is in repair, the loaner is checked out to that student, with a due date, and the loaner's serial is on the repair ticket. When the repair closes, the loaner comes back and both records close together. A loaner with no due date is a device you have given away.
Update status the day it changes. In repair, waiting on parts, back in service, retired. A device that went to repair in October and still reads "active" in March is how loaners disappear. If updating the sheet is the step everyone skips, that is the signal to move to a system where the status changes when the ticket does.
Before collection day
Three weeks out, pull the list of everything assigned to every student, by homeroom or advisory. Give each teacher their list. The point is not that teachers collect the devices; it is that the list exists and is specific: "Hana S. has DSD-1024, a Lenovo 300e, condition good at handout."
Send families the return date, the location, and what "complete" means (device, charger, case). People return things when they know exactly what is expected. Chargers are the most-lost item in every district I have worked in, because nobody assigns them; if you cannot assign chargers, at least count them in and out per homeroom.
Pull the repair tickets that are still open. Every device in repair in June needs a decision: fix it over the summer, retire it, or return it to a student in the fall. Do not let those devices ride into the new year as "in repair."
Decide the damage workflow in advance: who inspects, what counts as damage versus wear, what the family is charged if anything, and how a repair ticket gets filed on collection day without stopping the line.
Collection day
Same stations, reversed:
- Scan the device. The screen shows who it is assigned to and its handout condition.
- Confirm it is the right student's device. If it is not (students swap devices more than you think), record what actually happened: it comes back from whoever has it, and the assignment record is corrected.
- Inspect against the handout condition. Damage gets a repair ticket filed on the spot, linked to the serial, with a photo if you can.
- Check in the charger and case.
- Mark the assignment closed. The device is now unassigned and in the closet, the cart, or the repair queue.
Run the exception report at the end of the day, and it is the report that matters: every student who still owes a device, with the device's serial and model. That list goes to the office the same day for follow-up, while the students are still in the building. A week later it is a letter; a month later it is a loss.
Edventory's end-of-year workflow is built around this list: scan devices as they move, auto-file repair tickets for damage, and export exactly who still owes what. On a spreadsheet, a "returned" column and a filter gets you the list; the discipline is in running it the same day.
After collection
- Wipe and re-image returned devices as a batch, then set their status back to available, so August handout starts from a clean count.
- Close every open repair ticket with a decision: fixed, retired, or reissued.
- Retire what is past Auto Update Expiration. If a device stops getting updates before the fall, it should not go back on a desk. The free AUE report lists every device by the school year its AUE lands in from your Google Admin export, which is the fastest way to find them.
- Reconcile the count. Devices in inventory should equal devices in the closet plus carts plus repair plus retired plus "owed." Any gap is a device to find now, not next June.
- Record what you learned. Which model cracked the most, which grade lost the most chargers, how long the line was at each station. That is next year's plan.
Staff offboarding is the same playbook
A staff member leaving in June is a collection day for one person. Print everything assigned to them (laptop, hotspot, document camera, keys, badge), collect against the list on their last day, and close the assignments. There is a separate employee offboarding checklist for the details, but the principle is identical: start from what they hold, collect against the list, write down what happened.
The checklist
Before handout: fleet in one list keyed by serial; every device labelled; roster loaded; condition scale set; AUP printed.
Handout day: scan device, scan student, condition, AUP, hand over; exception report at end of day.
During the year: every repair is a ticket on the serial; every loaner has a due date and is tied to the ticket; status changes the day it changes.
Before collection: lists to homerooms three weeks out; families told the date and what "complete" means; open repairs decided; damage workflow agreed.
Collection day: scan, confirm owner, inspect against handout condition, file damage tickets on the spot, check in accessories, close the assignment; the "still owes" list to the office the same day.
After: wipe and re-image, close tickets, retire past-AUE devices, reconcile the count, write down what you learned.