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Kits FAQ

Kit Coordinator
Kit Reservations
Kit Pick-up and Return in Person
Kit Shipping
Kit Damage or Loss
Kit Purchasing

Kit FAQ

Expand the questions below to view answers to frequently asked questions (FAQ) about our Kits program. Or use the quick links buttons to jump to a particular FAQ section (Kit Coordinator, Kit Reservations, Kit Pick-up and Return In Person, Kit Shipping, Kit Damage or Loss or Kit Purchasing).

Kit Coordinator

Heather Phelps

Heather PhelpsEmail: heather.phelps@uwsp.edu
Phone: 715-346-2205
Office: 201E Student Service Center

Kit Reservations

There is no cost for borrowing a kit.

See information below for shipping costs.

Kits are available to formal and non-formal educators in Wisconsin. This includes anyone planning to use a kit for an educational purpose with children or youth or providing training to educators or future educators.

For those wanting to borrow a kit for personal use, or to share solely with adults, please contact the kit coordinator to discuss options for ensuring your reservation does not prevent the kit from fulfilling our primary mission of supporting K-12 students and teachers.

Kits can be borrowed by those 18 and older.  We encourage K-12 students, even those over 18, to ask a teacher or other staff member at your school to request the kit instead.

Kits are not available for borrowers outside of Wisconsin.

Kits can be borrowed for up to four weeks at a time.

If you would like to renew a kit, please contact the kit coordinator during the last week of your reservation, at least one day prior to the last day of your reservation. If the kit has not already been reserved by someone else, kits can be renewed for up to two additional two-week periods.

Kit reservations can be made up to a year in advance.

Multiple kits can be reserved for the same stretch of time, we just ask that you be considerate of others interested in borrowing our kits and not reserve more kits than you will be able to use at a time. Each kit needs a separate Request Form filled out for it.

Kit reservations are not confirmed until you are emailed by the kit coordinator saying so. This process may take several business days. If you have not heard back from the kit coordinator after three business days following your reservation request, please contact the kit coordinator directly to ensure your request was submitted correctly.

If you need to cancel a kit reservation, please inform the kit coordinator as soon as possible to make the kit available to others.

There are no overdue fines for kits, however, please be respectful of others who may have reserved the kit; kits are frequently scheduled back-to-back and a delay returning the kit from one site may impact the next borrower’s reservation.

Significant delays in returning a kit, especially without prompt communication to the kit coordinator to determine alternate return options, may result in a loss of kit borrowing privileges or being charged for a lost kit.

If you are not certain of the dates of a previously made kit reservation, or which kit(s) you have reserved, the kit coordinator can provide this information.

Kit scheduling is based on the order in which reservations are received. Before putting in a request, the WCEE strongly encourages checking the availability calendar on each kit’s information page, and choosing a stretch of time when the kit has not already been reserved.

Please note that shipping requires a minimum of two business days between reservations (included in the reservations on the availability calendar), and we strongly prefer a full week between reservations in order to check that all the contents of the kit are still present and in good condition before we send the kit onward to the next borrower. As such, please also note that an empty spot on the calendar does not guarantee that a kit reservation for that period will be possible.

Day-of reservations are not allowed. We encourage submitting reservation requests at least a week in advance to ensure sufficient time for processing your request, particularly if you will not be picking the kit up in person.

Please be aware that arranging shipping requires a minimum of three business days prior to the first day of the reservation, and may take additional time depending on staff availability.

The kit coordinator does not manage reservations for kits hosted at other sites. Please contact those sites directly to reserve their kits.

At the end of your reservation, the kit coordinator will send you an evaluation form. We encourage you to take this opportunity to provide feedback about the kit, including any praise you would like us to pass along to the organizations who have funded these kits, and any recommendations you have for improvement.

You are also always welcome to email feedback to the kit coordinator.

The kit program continues to run during the summer and during school breaks.

The kit program may take a break 1-2 times a year, such as around the holidays, to accommodate staff time off. Previously scheduled borrowers will be notified if any changes in the shipping schedules will be required. A warning will be placed on the Kit Request Form informing borrowers of the break and when the kit coordinator will return to office and start processing reservation requests again.

Kit Pick-up and Return in person

Kits can be picked up in person at the Wisconsin Center for Environmental Education (WCEE).

The WCEE is located at UW-Stevens Point on the second floor of Park Student Services Center (1108 Fremont St) in room 201. The office is typically open Monday-Friday, 9-5. As there are times all staff are out of the office, we recommend contacting the kit coordinator ahead of time, so WCEE staff know to expect you.

When you arrive on campus, you can park in Lot A, directly off Fremont Street, for up to 30 minutes. You must leave your hazard lights on while parked to avoid being ticketed.

Link to campus map: https://www.uwsp.edu/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/campusmap.pdf

Please ask at the WCEE office once you arrive if you would like to borrow a cart to transport a kit between the office and your vehicle or vice versa.

We ask that borrowers less than 30 miles away from UW-Stevens Point pick up and return kits in person.

In-person pick-up is required for kits which are too fragile, large, or in too many separate pieces to ship. These kits include the Groundwater Model Kit, Pedal Power Kit, Enviroscape, and Sun Oven.

In addition, borrowers who are picking up the Pedal Power for the first time are required to stay long enough to practice setting up and taking down the Pedal Power with staff. We recommend allowing at least fifteen minutes for this.

If picking up or returning a kit during standard open hours is impossible, please contact us and we’ll work with you to make other arrangements.

Kit Shipping

Kits are shipped around the state via SpeeDee Delivery, a door-to-door delivery service.

We offer shipping for addresses more than 30 miles from Stevens Point. As kits can only be requested by Wisconsin borrowers, we will not ship kits outside of Wisconsin.

The WCEE is waiving the costs of shipping kits for the 2024-2025 school year. However, we are providing kit recipients an option to be invoiced for half or all of the cost of shipping to support the WCEE’s mission of making quality hands-on resources equitably available across the state.

We hope to continue offering free shipping, but will inform borrowers if at any point we are no longer able to do so.

We will arrange shipping to and from the address you submit on your kit request form. If you are part of an organization, such as a school, with a front desk staffed during normal business hours, we recommend using the school’s address so that SpeeDee can drop the kit off at the school’s front office and pick it up from there to return it. SpeeDee does not deliver or pick up on weekends.

SpeeDee can also deliver to and pick up from private residences, but in that case we encourage you to work with us to choose dates where someone is expected to be home all day, to sign for the kit when it’s delivered and return it to SpeeDee without risk of anything happening to it while it’s sitting out on a front porch. Unfortunately, we cannot give any estimates of what time of day SpeeDee will drop by.

SpeeDee cannot deliver to or pick up from PO Boxes.

There is no need to provide a return shipping label; SpeeDee will bring that with them when they pick the kit up.

At pick-up, SpeeDee will leave behind a receipt for the shipping. No need to save this or send it to the WCEE; you can just recycle it. If you have chosen waived shipping, the WCEE will pay all the shipping costs. If you have chosen to pay half or all the shipping, the WCEE will email you an invoice for the shipping and handling costs after the kit has been returned to the WCEE.

The WCEE will try to arrange for the kit to be delivered the business day prior to the first day of the request so that you can expect to be able to use it the full first day of your request.

However, please note that SpeeDee does not guarantee delivery dates, and a variety of factors, including weather, delays in the kit’s return by the previous borrower, illness, etc., could all result in the kit’s arrival being delayed by a day or two. As such, we recommend requesting a start date for your kit reservation that’s several days prior to any special events which the kit must be there for. (This also allows you time to get to know the kit and its contents.)

We will arrange for the kit to be picked up on the weekday following the last day of your reservation. Please have the kit at the front office, ready to be returned, first thing in the morning (or even the night before – SpeeDee can arrive very early, and will not wait if the kit isn’t ready).

If either the planned delivery or pick up date (see the two questions above) don’t work, e.g. it’s spring break so the school office will be closed that day, please inform the kit coordinator as soon as possible so they can schedule a different date for the delivery and/or pick-up.

If there is a last-minute closure of the school such as a snow day, please inform the kit coordinator, so they can pass that information on to SpeeDee.

If the kit is not delivered or picked up on the date expected, please let the kit coordinator know. In most cases, SpeeDee will make a second attempt the following day, but this may impact other borrowers or indicate a problem with the shipping information.

 

Kit Damage or Loss

We encourage you to inspect the contents of the kit when it arrives. Each kit includes a checklist (available both in the kit and on our website) detailing exactly the items in the kit. If the kit has been delivered straight to you without having been checked in at the WCEE, it is particularly important for you to inspect the kit contents upon arrival. Report any lost or damaged kit contents to the kit coordinator immediately. Please also make use of the checklist to confirm everything has been returned to the kit before it goes back to the WCEE.

To reduce the risk of loss or damage of kit items, the kit and its contents should always be supervised when in use, and packed away in a secure location when not in use.

If you lose or damage any item, or discover any non-working items in the kit (e.g. a burned out lightbulb), please let the kit coordinator know as soon as possible so we can repair or replace that item prior to it being sent onward to another borrower.

The price for an entire lost kit is listed in the terms and conditions you agree to when submitting a reservation for a kit. Costs for individual missing items, or items damaged beyond normal wear and tear, will be assessed on a case-by-case basis. Under most circumstances, an equivalent replacement item is also accepted. For printed materials, small items, or items for which we already have replacements, we may waive the cost entirely, but that will be decided on a case-by-case basis.

Failure to pay for or provide a replacement for lost or damaged items will result in a loss of borrowing privileges.

Some items (e.g. the Smokey Bear Kits, 7-12 Bat Kit, Fishing for Fun Backpack, Enviroscapes, and Groundwater Model) include consumables, i.e. items that are intended to be used up by borrowers and don’t have to be returned.

For the Enviroscape and Groundwater Model, these are the powders and dyes used to simulate pollution. Please inform us if any are getting low and we’ll replenish them once the kit is returned to us.

For the Smokey Bear Kit, the DNR has graciously donated a variety of items such as pencils, erasers, stickers, etc. Based on the number of students you report planning to share the kit with, we will stock the kit with an assortment of items. The specific items will vary based on our availability, and once we run out, they will no longer be offered in the kit. Please ensure all permanent items are returned with the kit. Feel free to keep any or all of the consumable items; any you return in the kit will be included for the next borrower.

Kit Purchasing

The WCEE does not have the capacity to create kits for sale to other institutions.

Organizations are welcome to examine the Kit Content Checklists for inspiration for developing their own kits.

If you are having trouble finding where to purchase an item, please contact the WCEE and we will assist as we are able. (Unfortunately, some companies have gone out of business since we originally ordered kit materials from them.)