I think a website is a great idea ---and all schools should move towards a website PLUS PTA/PTO (our content is supposed to approved by school and district but I have the only website passwords -- PTA is on school site-- What are they gonna fire a volunteer who copyrighted and designed the site?? [img]tongue.gif[/img] - we tried to incorporate staff but they dont even know what to put on class pages or send in update)

Unfortunately most school and districts-- policy just doesnt live in the real world or understand real world IT and marketing or deadlines for that matter

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• Most dont have computer savvy indiv with time</font>
• Dont make the time or $ to make (not teach- learn or move on) teachers computer savvy</font>
• District doesnt spend enough on tech -the correct way )LAUSD tech plan is 635 pg of complete gibberish- theres no plan)</font>
• Dont understand marketing their schools especially Title I and neighboorhood schools ('OH enrollments down'-- Ya think maybe 'cuz no one knows your an LAUSD school and dont suck?)</font>

Example of/as above
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• It takes forever for info to be posted on website or to get info -- an unupdated website is worthless and people stop checking up</font>
• Most dont utilize listserve or email properly- If 80% of parent check email but throw away all the junk that comes home with Wed packet (and accidently the important stuff)- why wouldnt u use email?</font>
• Most districts/schools buy computer equipment when $$$ available -- then come up with Tech plan- curriculum (i.e. Cart before the horse syndrome/problem)</font>

US Education needs to get on the ball we already lag behind in Educational and Residential use of DSL (i.e 90% of Schools AND Households in Korea are DSL- compared to not even 50% in US)

In Europe and Asia -- 4th and 5ht grade can use MS Word and Excel (5th grade final project done with Word doc report, spreadsheets and linked graphs to a Powerpoint Presentation)


Kudo's to U for taking the initiative to create a wonderful addition to the Free WWW and using yet another way to communicate with your parents, community and stakeholders

[ 09-11-2006, 01:07 AM: Message edited by: Shawn ]

That is exactly what I am talking about. The thing about the school not allowing me to publish is very annoying to me. Here's my situation....

Our school is title one school wide, meaning that we have a high percentage of low income families. It's hard enough to find families who participate, let alone make offers to really help them with things like web design. I'm sure there are a few, but I wonder if it's just a new concept to this school. We are living in the heart of Silicon Valley, however, so one would probably appreciate a modern school with up to date technology and a nice website with lots of impressive information. I might be snooty to say this, but I hardly think they are in a position to turn down an offer to help them out. Oh well, that's only part of the problem. I know this neighborhood and we are not 60-70% low income. The problem is that people who are well educated are more likely (notice I'm just saying "more likely") to send their kids to private schools or to do a transfer to another school within the district with higher test scores than ours. I know several families who are doing that right now, so I'm not just speculating. Appearance is so important and marketing is key to leveling out the playing field. People relocating from other areas are likely to look at the internet for what schools are good and which ones are not. We have some awesome teachers that work so hard and are very well educated with lots of experience, but by looking on the internet, all you see are the test scores and say "what is wrong with the school?" That's why I wanted to get our PTO up and running and make a name for the school in our community and really put their best foot forward, so to speak, but I am stiffled by the administration's lack of vision in that area.

Please don't misunderstand what I am saying. The marketing of the school is just part of the picture. I have seen how hard the teachers work with our students and that is very important, which is why I think the PTO can play a vital role in this so that the teachers can focus their attention on the students and on teaching.

So, just to stay on topic, I have already looked into a domain name and the most logical name "ourschoolpto.org" is available for $12.95/year with free web hosting, but we need to get that tax ID # and qualify as a non profit org. To be honest, I have already designed the website on my computer, so as soon as I get the thumbs up after our first meeting on Sept 26th I'm going to get the site up, probably within hours or at the most within days.

Thanks for the reply!
Kathryn

I purchased our domain name and have full control over our PTO's website. So far there have not been any issues at all. Our school's website through the district is very bare bones. It doesn't not link to our website but I have not asked them to link to us either.

I am making it well known to the kids and parents that we have a website.

I love having full control. Last week within one hour after our board meeting ended the meeeting minutes were up on the website. How cool is that?

Vista Campana PTO

[ 09-11-2006, 12:34 PM: Message edited by: Jennia ]

I meant to say (in my first sentence) that I am volunteering to maintain the PTO website.

Kathryn

We're about to start a PTO this year and I would like to volunteer to maintain the school website. I found free web hosting for non profits, so I am going to recommend that we use that group. Here is my question (& it may not even be an issue), but I am helping maintain the school web site, but they are very touchy about giving me publishing priveledges. Like everything I do has to be approved and then the principal or another teacher who is in charge of that publishes it when I tell them that I am done. The major frustration is that they tend to take their time in publishing. For example, the newsletter (that comes out bi-weekly) goes on the site and sometimes the new one comes out before they even publish it for me. So, basically I just wasted time working on it and no one published it. I look the other way because they probably have a policy about being held responsible for the school web site (communications from the school, etc....). However, with a PTO, which will be a separate entity from the school, I figured we could have a link on the school web site to the PTO site, but the PTO site would be maintained separately. Since I am working on both sites I can make them flow easily so they don't look different from each other.

Maybe it's just a control thing on my part, but I hate having to ask people to do things for me especially if they don't do them in a timely manner and I know how to do it myself, but am not allowed. But, I feel I am here to serve so I do so with a smile on my face. I'm just curious about other schools and how a web site is run.

Thanks,
Kathryn