NHCS Web Page Guidelines

Web Page Guidelines/Procedures

Purpose

The intention of this set of guidelines is to provide a degree of consistency, quality and general direction of how the school system, departments and schools will be represented to the community and beyond. In publishing on the Internet, remember that the goals of the pages are to introduce external visitors to the school system, its department or its school, to direct internal/external users to internal curriculum resources and to direct internal users to quality outside information.

Responsibility

District Level:

The Technology Department will be responsible for providing technical support as well as maintaining the district’s web server. Training for the development of web pages will be provided as the need arises. The Webmaster will manage access to the district web server. The Web Oversight Committee is responsible for the development of these guidelines and reserves the right to final approval for all web pages.

Building/Department Level

The school/department website is a public document welcoming the outside world to the school/department. Responsibility for its design and content rests with the principal/department head. Principals/department heads may delegate that responsibility to a staff member. All pages must be reviewed prior to placement on the district web server. Access to the web server will be limited to the school employee responsible for the website. Access to the server must be approved by the Technology Department. No student will have access to the district web server. The persons responsible for the development of web pages need to make themselves familiar with these guidelines. Failure to adhere to the guidelines may result in the loss of authoring privileges or stronger disciplinary measures.

Subject Matter

Information to include:

School name, street address, phone number and email address

Date last revised

Initials or name of person responsible for the web page

Calendar of school events

Mission statement

Administrative staff

A link to the district website

Each page within a site should contain a link back to the school/department home page.

Content should be related to curriculum, instruction, school-authorized activities or district activities.

No student web pages shall be posted on the web server, nor shall a school site have links to students’ pages.

Staff may have school/department-related web pages, but not personal or business related pages.

If the school has a partnership with an area business, a mention may be made about the partnership, but no logos of the business or links to the business website may be included.

Staff and student work may be published only as it relates to a class project, course, or other school related activity. You must have prior written permission using the NHCS student release form.

Quality

All work should be free of spelling and grammatical errors.

No objectionable or possibly inflammatory information shall be posted.

Any student work to appear on the site should be reviewed for quality by the staff member responsible for posting the web pages on the server.

Maintenance

Revisions should be done at least monthly. To maintain a quality site, outdated information should be replaced and links should be checked regularly. If a site cannot be revised at least monthly, it should not be placed on the district web server. Do not use the server to store files for future use. Upload only the files that currently make up the website.

Student/Staff Safeguards

Use only first names of students when publishing pictures. Never use student phone numbers, email addresses, or street addresses.

Names, work numbers, and email addresses of staff are public information and may be used on the website. Email addresses should be limited to school assigned addresses.

No pictures or work of staff or students may be used without signed permission using the approved release form. A copy of the signed release form should be kept on file by the school/department.

Technical Standards

The total size of the website may not exceed 10 MB of hard disk space. Additional space for special projects may be allotted at the discretion of the webmaster.

Each individual page should not exceed 65 KB.

The first page should be named index.htm or index.html.

Graphics should be saved as .gif or .jpg. Avoid using large graphics that will be very slow to load. Each individual picture should not exceed 10KB if possible.

The site should be revised at least once a month. The authorized staff member, who is publishing the pages, should test the page for accurate links and check for conformance to all NHCS web standards.

Do not include links to incomplete pages within your site or to other sites that are incomplete. Do not use “under construction” signs.

Link only to sites that contain curriculum related materials.

Copyright

The author of the website has the responsibility to see that there is no infringement on copyrighted material.

No unlawful copies of copyrighted material may be produced or transmitted via the district web server.

Permission to use copyrighted material should be obtained directly from the copyright owner using the permission form outlined by the Web Oversight Committee. Print out responses and keep on file at the school/department.

A copyright statement should be included on the home page that will cover all subsequent pages.

When linking to external sites, permission should be obtained directly from the site manager using the permission form outlined by the Web Oversight Committee. No response to your email means permission to link is denied. Print out the responses and keep on file at the school/department.

Teacher Web Pages

Teachers in the New Hanover County Schools system are encouraged to develop a web page as way to foster communication between parents and students and the classroom. There are three approved options available for creating a web page: School Notes, TeacherWeb, and NC Classes Online. All three options allow teachers to edit their web pages online without the need for special software. Information about the three options is available at each school or from the Technology Department. Teacher web pages must adhere to the guidelines outlined above. (Technical standards dealing with file size, file naming and image size may be determined by the choice of outside service provider.)

Revision of Guidelines

These guidelines will be evaluated and updated as needed in response to the changing nature of technology. Questions may be directed to

Dolores McLean, Webmaster
Technology Department
New Hanover County Schools
910-254-4109
dmmclean@nhcs.k12.nc.us

Revised 5/02

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