Case Study

Background Ann Arbor Public Schools (AAPS) is a midsize school district within the state of Michigan. The district encompasses 31 city schools: 5 high schools, 5 middle schools, and 21 elementary schools. In total the district has 900 classrooms, 1200 plus teachers and assistants, and 35 technical support staff. As a school district, Ann Arbor Public Schools provides leadership to its jurisdiction and operates under the benchmarks and goals set by the State of Michigan.

Synopsis

AAPS's Technology Department is an active participant and plays a significant role in the Planning and Business Services division for the district. The Technology Department maintains the computer resources required for AAPS’s administration, and also facilitates Internet computing services, connecting various schools within the district. Included in this service is the provision of the AAPS's local and wide area network, file servers, e-mail servers, internet, web functions, instructional services, advance technical support and additional services and resources.

The Technology Department’s goal was to expose each individual department and school on the Internet. They soon realized that traditional web publishing solutions and service bureaus were not the answer. They began to search for an easy to use tool that would permit non-technical staff to independently create and maintain websites for their own department or school, while at the same time enhance the ability of the Technology Department to set publishing standards for website structure, design and style for the entire district.

Earlier Method of Creating Websites

The current offering of traditional website development tools and services for the schools were very expensive and time consuming solutions and they did not meet the needs or goals of the district. The Technology Department and the individual schools contracted web developers and designers to create various websites. Outsourcing with service bureaus resulted in a hodgepodge of inefficient and ineffective activities. Not only was it a slow turn-around time for creating websites, but managing and updating website content was difficult to accomplish. In addition, the Technology Department found it impossible to control, at any level, website publishing standards from one school to the next. It was soon realized that unless an alternative was found, the district's current website publishing solution and its goal would continue to be a timely and increasingly costly endeavor.

Selection Criteria

AAPS considered four distinct factors that would influence what application to incorporate as their website development and management solution:

• reduce costs
• improve website services to the district
• allow individuals to create websites with little time and effort
• provide internal control to manage and administrate all school websites.

The over all focus was to expand and enhance the Technology Department's website services, increase the school and district's presence on the internet and to bring greater benefits to AAPS and surrounding communities by visibly communicating information.

Even though GVC.SiteMaker addressed all of AAPS's selection criteria, initial interest in GVC.SiteMaker was the result of it being used by the University of Michigan. As it is very successfully implemented and used as a website creation and management tool by many faculty, students and staff within a renowned and reputable education institution, AAPS, operating in its shadow, further inquired and researched this option.

The Solution

Howard Moskowitz, Director of Technology for AAPS has only the best to say about GVC.SiteMaker. “It wasn’t a difficult choice to make after researching alternatives. It is an application that best matched our needs, and nothing else seemed to match as much.” Amid the alternatives, GVC.SiteMaker is the only application that allowed for non-technical people the opportunity to create fully functional websites while giving the Technology Department the authority to administrate and manage them. Other applications do not give non-site owners the authoritarian position to edit content, or provoke publications.

An easy to use website application was especially important for AAPS. They directed their decision based on how business was done prior, and how business should be maintained and carried out in the future. AAPS focused on an application that allowed everyone, including faculty, students, staff and department heads, to be involved in website creation without going through intense training.

The Benefits

Technological – GVC.SiteMaker makes it easier for non-technical people to become involved in creating websites. HTML experience is not required and websites can easily be linked to other websites.

Organizing – Each website or web page built in GVC.SiteMaker remains in the hands of the Technology Department because they secure the role as the top-level site administrators. The Technology Department controls consistency in style, design and the common look and feel and can implement navigation standards.

Training – The Technology Department can teach individuals to use the GVC.SiteMaker with a minimal learning curve.

Communicating – Having information posted on the Internet puts citizens in touch with district and school events and resources. Information is current because updating content is much easier.

Current Structure

AAPS has more than two hundred (200) websites created by GVC.SiteMaker, which are personalized to each school and staff member, and additional websites that are currently underdeveloped. The Technology Department continues to successfully oversee and support each website in the district. Two System Administrators, called Web Masters assist and supervise Unit Administrators who are also known as Web Masters for each school. Interesting enough, these administrative positions are voluntary, yet there is a high level of interest by staff to offer their services in this regard.

Currently, two hundred (200) plus teachers have been trained on GVC.SiteMaker and this number is expected to increase.

Howard Moskowitz says, "we have been able to involve a broad spectrum of staff in creating their own web-sites because of the ease of use of SiteMaker. All-in-all I am very pleased to be using this outstanding web development product".

Future Plans

Ann Arbor Public Schools has future plans to use GVC.SiteMaker to its full potential. A mandate will be set this year for all schools and departments (i.e. Business, Human Resources) to have a published web-site on the Internet. Currently, fifty percent (50%) of the schools have web-sites, but the goal is to see a one hundred percent (100%) adoption rate. Since using GVC.SiteMaker, creating and managing a website is inexpensive and effortless, and both the AAPS and the Technology Department agree that there is no excuse not to be published online.