IMHO-- Our District Web Pages Are 'Old School'

District web pages were the topic of a podcast by Jeff Moore over on One Big Head. He is a very forward thinker and one podcast that I never delete, until I have replayed in my iPod a couple of times while working out in the gym after school. I am still trying to get my head around what Jeff talks about in this episode. I may have to listen to the podcast again tomorrow after a good night's sleep. I liked the way Jeff weaved the idea of how schools have an industrial culture. Well that is not how he states it. He is much more politically correct. Schools have a culture. State and Federal mandates along with local goals direct our school web page content. What content is on our pages reflects the industrial nature/departmentalized approach to managing our schools. Should we change our districts website? Not if it is just for looks. Not just to change for the heck of it. We should change to reflect the evolution of the Internet. It is time for our district to begin moving from the static web page to dynamic information content management.

In this episode, I offer thoughts on MySpace that are going to make me unpopular. Listen carefully, though--it's not MySpace that's the problem. It's our institution. Also, some realizations about my school district's website: how can its evolution bring change in the organization at large? We use Mambo, which forced us to do some things differently. Click here to listen.