The United States Postal Service announced refined service standards for certain market-dominant services. This includes service standard adjustments for First-Class Mail, Periodicals, Marketing Mail, and Package Services (Bound Printed Matter, Media Mail, and Library Mail). The changes will maintain service at existing levels for most volume and upgrade standards for more market-dominant volume than is downgraded. The changes will enhance service reliability nationwide while maintaining the existing five-day service standard day range for First-Class Mail, whereas the day ranges for end-to-end Marketing Mail, Periodicals and Package Services will be shortened. Similar changes will be made with respect to the Postal Service’s competitive products. As a result of these refined service standards, the Postal Service projects at least $36 billion in savings over 10 years from transportation, mail processing, and real estate cost reductions. As part of the ongoing “Delivering for America” plan, the Postal Service has to date lowered $1.8 billion in annual transportation costs by eliminating redundant networks and rationalizing the use of air and surface options, and reduced 45 million workhours, or $2.3 billion annually, by improving plant productivity, and eliminating unnecessary facilities. In addition, the Postal Service has increased revenue by $3.5 billion annually while transitioning its product offerings in the face of significant declines in mail volume.

Unit sales of print books fell 5.5% in the week ended May 30, 2020, compared to the week ended May 23, at outlets that report to NPD BookScan. The decline was mainly due to a 25.5% drop in unit sales in the young adult category, in which The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes by Suzanne Collins sold about 270,000 copies when it was initially released. Even with the decline compared to the prior week, unit sales were up 8.1% compared to the similar week in 2019.

Savvas Learning Company, a K-12 next-generation learning solutions leader, today announced that its Experience Physics program has been named a 2023 SIIA CODiE Award Finalist in the “Best Science Instructional Solution for Grades 9-12” category. Experience Physics © 2022 is a modern high school physics curriculum that implements an interactive learning model using the exploration of phenomena to drive student engagement. The program places students center stage as they make sense of phenomena with experiential learning routines that connect physics to the real world. Experience Physics also uniquely supports educators with comprehensive, editable resources and flexible teaching tools that allow them to adapt instruction to their students’ diverse learning needs.