August 2006 — Features
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Content Management: If You Build It Right, They Will Come
Easy-to-use content management systems are helping schools and districts create websites that appeal to the eye—and to users.
YOU’RE RELAXING AT HOME on a Thursday evening, but the phone call means trouble.
Local favorite Flopsy the Clown can’t host tomorrow night’s annual Aaron Burr High
School dance-a-thon after all. However, he can show up to introduce Saturday afternoon’s
performance of the Alexander Hamilton Middle School jazz quintet. You’re the events
coordinator for the school district—what can you do to notify people in time? The last two
things you want are a dissatisfied mob at the dance and low turnout at the concert. But you
don’t have time to call 7,521 families, even with speed dial. Is there any way to save the
community from chaos and yourself from humiliation?
There is if you have a good content management system—if your school community uses a website that can not only publicize events but also send out timely alerts. From the comfy chair of your home office, you log on to the district’s site, navigate to the appropriate page, calmly type out the clever 32-point headline “Flopsy Drops Hop, Opts for Pops,” and provide the necessary details. With an authoritative click, you send the message to everyone who’s anyone, confident that by the weekend personal schedules will be rearranged accordingly. Once again, you’re the hero.
New and Improved
It wasn’t always like this. Listen to Bob Asselin. He’s the technology integration specialist at the Windham School Department in Maine. Windham is a bedroom community outside Portland— two elementary schools, one middle school, one high school, and one alternative high school. Asselin spent 29 years teaching high school biology, then decided to get a master’s degree in computer education. In 2002 he moved into his current position, and in 2004 he determined that the district needed a content management system.
Why? “Our web pages were abominable,” Asselin says. Each school had its own website, with one person per school designated to enter data. There was no consistency among the sites; the district had no signature look or feel. People in the community were constantly complaining about not getting enough information in a timely manner. “We just didn’t have the time or resources to keep everything updated and consistent,” says Asselin. “We were in bad shape.” What Windham needed was the help of a professional.
