Going Digital

My Sunday School team is discussing how best to format the next revision of Sunday School material for Concordia Publishing House. This would be for material published for fall 2015 and following quarters. Among our observations are these points:

• Our scope and sequence is pretty solid; we might eliminate a bit of the annual repetition imposed by the Church Year.
• The biblical art created for Growing in Christ and reused in Cross Explorations is a winner.
• The demand for Sunday School material in general continues in a downward trend; many congregations are struggling to maintain their Sunday School in the face of a poor economy and fewer students.
• Advances in digital publishing suggest that we look seriously at how Sunday School material for teachers and students could be provided to congregations digitally.

Digital Sunday School material represents serious challenges. Our Sunday School customers are often late-adopters of technology. A significant part of our financial investment is recovered through sale of student material. For each teacher guide we sell five to ten student sets in our "print model." The financial picture changes radically if we are selling just one digital set of material that is then printed locally. Most of our publishing costs do not go away. The process of developing, writing, editing, and playing out the material in a designed format still remain; only the printing cost are reduced, which is a small part of the total investment.

Digital material also presents several significant advantages. Customers could have some choice in designing their own scope and sequence. Distribution of material to teachers might also be possible electronically.

Do you have time to answer a couple of questions about this possibility?

Would you purchase Sunday School materials as a digital subscription?

What advantages would you look for?

Would you print student material locally in color or black and white?

I would love to hear your thoughts on this thorny issue. Leave me a comment or write me at tom.nummela@cph.org.

God's blessings as you teach His children His Word.