YouthBuild Philly Quickly Sees Improvements in Efficiency and Reporting with Asset Panda

Summary

YouthBuild Philly is a charter school that empowers young adults between the ages of 17-20 to develop skills and build connections that ensure academic and career success. Founded in 1991, the school offers a two-year program to help these young adults earn their high school diplomas and build vital job skills through academics, vocational training, and community service.

To effectively track and manage their IT devices, fixed assets, and fleet of vehicles, YouthBuild Philly signed on with Asset Panda in February of 2023.

The Challenge

Before implementing Asset Panda, the YouthBuild Philly team was primarily using spreadsheets to track and manage numerous types of assets. With various spreadsheets to keep tabs on, their team faced two main challenges.

• Inefficient asset tracking: Maintaining accurate asset data in a spreadsheet is difficult for any organization, and this was no different for YouthBuild Philly. With multiple team members updating various spreadsheet versions and the inability to track change history, the team struggled to manage their assets effectively.
• Missing assets: With a lack of visibility into their asset inventory, the YouthBuild Philly team knew they were losing assets but sometimes struggled to pinpoint exactly what was missing. “Before using an asset management solution, we were losing track of assets and struggling to keep track of spreadsheets,” Senior Accountant Jackie Cline said. “We just weren’t really sure what was on our books, and doing inventory was very difficult.”

The Solution

Upon replacing their spreadsheet-tracking methods with Asset Panda’s centralized system, the YouthBuild Philly team realized a huge improvement in their asset management and reporting capabilities in just a few short months. “Just being able to see everything so transparently and going through it with a fine-tooth comb has helped us really clean up our assets,” Cline said.

Beyond gaining full visibility into their asset inventory, YouthBuild Philly has realized several benefits since using Asset Panda.

1. Streamlined workflows: Using Asset Panda’s highly configurable platform, the YouthBuild Philly team has been able to customize their workflows for optimal efficiency. “We’re very used to doing things certain ways, and most of the other programs out there were not very customizable or very user-friendly,” Cline said. This customizability not only ensured an intuitive user experience for their Asset Panda users but also allowed them to track various kinds of assets in one centralized system, including IT assets, workforce training equipment, and more.
2. Enhanced accountability: With the ability to seamlessly track and assign all their assets in one system, the YouthBuild Philly team also improved accountability among their students and staff. “[Asset Panda] is really functional in a school setting – we've been able to customize things to the point where we can either assign things to teachers or to specific rooms, and even check things out to students individually,” Cline said. “It really helps us track where equipment is moving, be better organized as a school, and hold people accountable as equipment does go missing.”
3. Robust reporting: Beyond everyday asset management and deployment, reporting on the status and value of their assets is vital for YouthBuild Philly. Cline said Asset Panda’s customizable reports and dashboards allow them to view their inventory both at a birds-eye view and with a fine-tooth comb. “Just being able to see everything so transparently has helped us really clean up our assets. There are just so many options to customize [reports] and see things in different formats and really capture all the data that we need,” Cline said.
4. Better budget control: For the small charter school, Asset Panda has played a large role in helping YouthBuild Philly make the most of their limited budget. Beyond improving their asset tracking program to minimize loss, Cline said Asset Panda was a cost-effective option for their school to implement. “Working in a charter school, there’s a tight budget and we’re often working with certain kinds of constraints,” Cline said. “I would really suggest Asset Panda as being the most cost-effective and robust software that you can get for that amount of money.”

Conclusion

Since regaining control over their assets, YouthBuild Philly has seen a large increase in efficiency and accountability at their school. “My entire team is so excited to be able to have this real control and visibility of everything at a glance,” Cline said.

While six of their team members have been effectively managing IT devices, fixed assets, and vehicles in Asset Panda, they’re soon scaling their program to add three more users and an additional use case: inventory tracking.

“We’re going to track things like swag for recruiting events, student uniforms, and staff uniforms,” Cline said. “Being able to track when those items are leaving storage and being notified when there’s a minimum quantity hit is going to be a game changer.”

No matter the size of your charter school or K-12 district, Asset Panda’s highly flexible software can help you gain visibility into all your assets. Check out our on-demand demo to learn more or request your personalized demo to get started with Asset Panda.