School Websites—Are They Impossible to Manage?

As Websites become essential to schools, it’s difficult to know what should be placed on them, who should have access to what, and how to keep up with supervision and maintenance of content. If you search online for ideas, you’ll find the usual: include your AUP, stress what’s considered private information with students, provide a school calendar and contact information, set up firewalls and filters, etc. But you won’t find everything you need. For example:

1. While many school sites provide different levels of access for parents, students, and faculty, it’s not easy to decide what should go into which areas and how much of the site should be public.
   
   
2. Schools have tended not to put student names on sites, but releases sent by schools to the media often end up on media sites. Such releases may broadcast student names, pictures, and towns, and highlight involvement in specific activities. What does this mean for school Websites?
   
   
3. Although schools may not list sporting events, schedules, and their locations except for student or parent access; coaches from other schools, news reporters, and community members interested in following teams may appreciate this information. Should sports and perhaps other activity notices be public even though they detail where which students are when?
   
   
4. The whole realm of interactivity and supervision/monitoring can be overwhelming. Does your site link to social networks such as Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, Flickr, or Pinterest? How about student blogs? Is it intertwined with a course management system such as Moodle? How do you handle comments on your site or the social networks? The list goes on.
   
   
5. And then, there’s site maintenance of content. Are teachers keeping their Moodle pages current, is the information about your courses correct, are your staff lists and content information up-to-date, have you changed your AUP to keep up with new technologies, are the latest sports rosters posted, were the changes in the school activities schedule put online, if a correction is needed, who makes it? . . .

 Most schools can’t afford full-time Internet managers, but as parents begin to expect more and more from schools—up-to-the-minute information, photos from field trips, info on programs, videos of activities, and interactivity and resources for themselves and their children, how can schools keep up?

What Makes Finland’s Students Excel?

Finnish students score tops in the world in reading, mathematics, and science even though the schools include many immigrant children who come to Finland not knowing the language. Why are the students doing so well when we in the U.S. don’t seem to be making progress? According to Finnish teachers, they do whatever it takes to make their students successful. This might mean having boys read Captain Underpants to encourage them to get going with reading or “park” a student who needs private instruction next to the teacher’s desk. LynNell Hancock’s “Why Are Finland’s School’s Successful” (Smithsonian Magazine, September 2011) explains that: Finnish teachers are “selected from the top 10 percent of the nation’s graduates to earn a required master’s degree in education”; about 30 percent of students are given additional help; each school has the same broad national goals; students learn how to learn instead of how to take a test (only one test is required and that is in the senior year); students begin school at age 7, but most children attend a public preschool at 5 or 6; there is an emphasis upon physical activity between studies; students do not have much homework; there are no Internet filters, and very few students are pulled out for special classes (mostly for Finnish language instruction). Teachers have the same status in the country as doctors and lawyers, usually have aides or learning specialists to help them, and the student to teacher ratio is low—about 7-1 in one school. Towns guide school policies and accountability is determined by the teachers and principals in the schools. Medical care, food, and other forms of help are provided in the schools for students who need it.  Whatever the ingredients that go into Finland’s success with its students, “teachers are trusted to do whatever it takes to turn young lives around.”

Need a Web Filtering and Reporting System for Tablets?

M86 Security has just released (December 2011) a Web filtering and reporting suite that schools can use with mobile tablets using Android or iOS operating systems. Called the M86 WFR 4.2, the software provides a safe learning environment for the use of tablets in schools. Be on the lookout for information on this product on the M86 Security site. If you want to learn more now, contact Jan Wiedrick-Kozlowski at Activa Public Relations.