Design and
Choice of Common Elements in DAEP School Websites
In Arlington
Independent School District, all schools have school websites. School websites introduce the community to
the school – “its mission, its character, its look, its offering to children,
its stance on new technologies, and its spirit” (McKenzie, 1997). “One of the most
important steps involved in creating a school web site is deciding what content
will be included and how it will be organized. Building a school web site
provides a unique addition to the curriculum. In the development phase,
students and teachers should discuss the kinds of materials they want to add to
the site” (Florida Center for Instructional Technology, 2004, chap. 1). The need for
improvement was determined by the need for a school website at Turning Point
Junior High and the need for a fully researched and developed plan for creating
the website.
My
action research focuses on the frequency of appearance of common elements
selected for disciplinary alternative education school websites and then it
surveys parents, students, and faculty on their judged values of a selected
group of those common elements. Common
elements of most school websites include elements such as a mission statement,
physical location of the school, a mascot, among others. Arlington Independent School District
includes the following elements as a matter of practice: school name, address, phone number,
principal, assistant principal, counselor/social worker, school hours/bell
schedule, enrollment/demographics, school colors, mascot, motto, accountability
and assessment data. This research
strives to examine the preferred elements of all stakeholders to help design
Turning Point Junior High’s first school website.
My research
requires the following actions that are measurable: define DAEP, survey thirty or more DAEP
school websites to measure the common website elements – graph in Excel, choose
the most often used website elements and use them to develop an anonymous
survey for parents, student, and faculty,
survey faculty, parents, and students to rank the importance of common
school website elements, report the results to all stakeholders through
meetings and a website, take action and develop a website using the results of
surveys and the building of consensus among stakeholders.
Research was
conducted to determine previous research done on the best approach for
developing new websites for schools.
Kurt Lewin said it best, “In a field that lacks objective standards of
achievement, no learning can take place. If we cannot judge whether an action
has led forward or backward, if we have no criteria for evaluating the relation
between effort and achievement, there is nothing to prevent us from making the
wrong conclusions and to encourage the wrong work habits. Realistic fact-finding and evaluation is a
prerequisite for any learning” (Lewin, K., 1946, p. 34). There was a lack of research on best
practices for creating school websites as of the writing of this research.
While research
in the area of building school websites was limited, what research there was
did encourage an organized approach to creating a school website would be
beneficial over time. “Content analysis
of items currently included in school websites and stakeholder judgments of
items desired in school websites, remain absent in the existing literature” (Miller, S., Adsit, K. I., & Miller, T., 2005, p. 34). However, from the research available, “data
indicates a need for schools to examine websites in light of the commonly
agreed-to desirable features” (Miller, S. et al., 2005, p. 39). Again, One of the best ways to determine what
to include (in school library websites) is by looking at other sites (Jurkowski, O., 2004). Further, “data
suggests that it is important for schools to be aware of the specific needs of
specific audiences” (Miller, S. et al., 2005).
I used emails, discussions,
and meetings to articulate the need and vision of the action research. Further, the survey indicated the vision and
need for a new school website at TPJH and asked all stakeholders to rank the
website elements from 5 to 1. Five being
“a very important feature that must be included on our site” to one, I do not
want this feature included in our website.
Strategies for
organizing the implementation of the project are varied. Concerning privacy and
safety of all stakeholders, the survey was completely anonymous and did not
have any questions that were controversial in any way. I had preliminary meetings to ascertain the
most common DAEP school website elements and to set up the use of the surveys
with all stakeholders. I am now at the
point where we are about to begin to disseminate the survey results, begin to
decide the design standards for the website, and add the website elements after
discussion of survey results and achieving consensus from the TPJH school
website committee. Our goal is to develop
a website that contributes to the school climate, safety, and student learning
by communicating with all stakeholders needed information that will help
facilitate the smooth operation of the school and provide a needed quick
reference for all stakeholders.
The strategies
used to lead the operations of the project and set priorities included several points.
I used informal meetings to elicit members for the committee and will use a
project website to lead the operations of the project, to set priorities, and
communicate meetings times and dates. I
have developed a website that has a home page and three tentative meeting dates;
more will be scheduled if needed. Each
meeting will have pre-meeting tasks, an agenda, and meeting goals. Results of research on best practices on
website design and surveys will be presented in a power point and disseminated
to the committee and published to the project website. The project website will
help lead and document results for all stakeholders.
My action research project
will serve the needs of all stakeholders by communicating Turning Point Junior
High’s mission and vision more fully.
The website will provide needed intake and transition information to all
stakeholders reducing unnecessary anxiety and assisting in a smoother
transition to and from the regular campus.
For example, according to surveys all stakeholders are interested in
seeing dress code information on the website.
It is foreseeable that the website will show, in pictures, the dress
code and provide English and Spanish subtitles.
This would help ELL’s and Special Education students, who have reading
difficulties to see what the dress code at Turning Point is. Further, it would
reduce the stress that occurs between all stakeholders from misunderstandings
concerning dress code.
References
Florida
Center for Instructional Technology. (2004). A teacher’s guide to school web
sites. University of South Florida, College of Education. Retrieved from
http://fcit.usf.edu/websites/chap1/chap1.htm
Jurkowski, O. (2004). School library website
components. Tech Trends: Linking Research & Practice to Improve Learning,
48(6), 56–60.
Lewin, K. (1946). Action research and
minority problems. Journal of Social Issues, 2(4), 34–36.
McKenzie, J. (1997). Why in the world wide
web? Reasons for schools to create web sites. From Now On The Educational
Technology Journal. Retrieved September 15, 2012, from
http://fno.org/mar97/why.html
Miller, S., Adsit, K. I., & Miller, T.
(2005). Evaluating the Importance of Common Components in School-Based
Websites: Fr... Tech Trends: Linking Research & Practice to Improve
Learning, 49(6), 34–40.
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