School Websites

Assignment 2: In your blog, write your reactions to the websites you looked at. Some of the questions you could consider include:
• What are your reactions to the websites you looked at?
• Is a website like this useful to a school district?
• Is it worth the time and effort to establish and maintain such a website?
• What is the condition of your school’s website?
• What information should be included in a school website?
• What role should the superintendent have with the school website?
• Should each teacher be required to have a link on the school website that contains information about their classes (such as assignments, web resources, etc)?
• How can students be involved creating and maintaining a school website?

It appears that many school district websites are very professionally done.  I wonder how they go about creating the design for their site.  Are they hiring companies to create it or are they doing it internally?  Who is responsible for the website in a large district like Sioux falls or rapid city?  I designed and currently maintain the Marion website, which is a daily task.  My philosophy about a school or a teacher website is that if it is not maintained and kept up to date and accurate then you are better off not having one at all.
These other school sites all have a lot of information, but I found it hard to find the teachers and if they had web pages, especially on the large district websites.   When designing our school site, and my own website when I was teaching, I tried to think of any possible question a parent or student might have and then find a place, link or page where I can have that information available for them.  Over time, the amount of use that particular page or link gets will help me determine the most important pages to update first or most often.
Having a school website is not an optional facet of your school, it is a requirement and is expected by the community.  But now, having a website may not be enough. We need to considering twitter and Facebook as additional Internet forms of communication.  Schools need to constantly change the communication practices to adapt to the ways in which their stakeholders prefer to communicate.
A school superintendent's role regarding the school website should be three-fold.
They should have a place for a superintendent message and use it frequently, they should determine who/what company is in charge of the design, creation, and updating, and they should have set the parameters for the types of information that should or should not be placed on the website.  Superintendents may be more involved if they choose or have the technologically savvy.  
Many teachers have also created we pages of their own.  While this does not necessarily need to be a requirement, it has become an expectation of many parents.  The important thing that teachers need to is decide how they are going to use their website and then consistently update it.  I have always suggested to teachers that if they are not keeping their site up to date then I don't want them to publicize or link it on the district page.
Sometimes students have an interest in creating or designing a web page whether it be for a class or a school group or club.  In these situations I make sure the adult mentor has set parameters and supervision over the publishing of the site.  What I like to do is have some of our graphics classes create themed banners for the website each month or season.  
I have been in charge of designing and maintaining the Marion website for the past 3 years.  I have come to realize just how much I rely on the website to convey our district information.  I now use our district Facebook page and my Twitter page to direct parents and students to particular pages of the website.