State of Sagamore online, fall 2013

On 2013-08-20 at 8:30p, Monica Ellingson, John Lenz, Dave Barker, and Peter Helander, held a recorded video conference to discuss the state of Sagamore Hills online efforts. Here are the meeting's notes and workspace (i.e. edit away!).

Contents

1. 0:00 [Dave] Meeting objective Bring into the fold a new Sagamore parent, enthusiastic about improving Sagamore's online presence
2. 2:20 [John] Future county (Sagamore) website platform Heard that DeKalb County Schools, current host of the school website, will force their school sites into a unified platform (CMS (Content Management System)). Cookie-cutter system that wreck current school site branding. (http://list.9.0ne.org/archive/sagamore.online/2013-August/000066.html)
3. 4:20 [John] Can't do custom school email School email is provided by county and is therefor fixed
4. 5:00 [John] Working with constraints Current school site compares well to comparables. Don't hang up on technology, help to make what's available, better. School site platform is fixed by the county, the PTA site is ours and can run anything (Wordpress, et al.). It's still a question if we want to abandon the conty site and link into a PTA constructed site, fold the PTA site in to the school (county) site, or something else.
5. 9:45 [Peter] Commit to PTA site The future county platform (that the school website would use) will be terrible. Make the PTA primary and link into county when needed. The terrible experience of DeKalb's future CMS introduction (http://fc.dekalb.k12.ga.us/~its/?OpenItemURL=S1DEDC58F) is telling. (http://list.9.0ne.org/archive/sagamore.online/2013-August/000073.html)
6. 12:55 [John] Appreciate backgrounds Monica (former PTA co-president) is highly capable in her professional life, as are other volunteers.
7. 15:10 [Monica] Respect volunteers and their time Respect the backgrounds of volunteers and the time they've given as we move forward.
8. 15:35 [Monica] Prior goal, fold PTA site into branded school site A couple years ago the plan was to build branding on the school site, then fold PTA content into the well branded school site
9. 16:15 [Monica] We can move current school site assets to PTA site If the school site becomes too constrained by the future county platform, we can move the current school site's assets to the PTA site, where the past couple year's improvements on the school site can live on.
10. 17:15 [Peter] Survey parent website expectations Tools such as http://webengage.com/ are quick and easy to implement.
11. 22:55 [Peter] More FAQs As a new parent, I wanted to find more FAQs.
12. 26:20 [Monica] More FAQs Sagamore is eager for improved FAQs, both online and off. Peter is in a unique position to contribute, with the frustrations of being new to the school fresh in his memory.
13. 28:10 [Dave] Open Collaboration Let your work be accessible while in progress so that others can contribute.
14. 29:20 [Monica] Capture new parent perspective The new parent perspective can only really be captured during the first few month new to the school, so Peter sharing is great.
15. 31:25 [Peter] New theme for PTA site It's easy to setup an improved theme for the PTA site.
16. 32:20 [Peter] Peter will document new parent perspective Peter will take a stab at "10 questions from new parents" and "FAQ", referring to what Dave started ([1], [2], [3])
17. 33:20 [John] Fractional participation is unavoidable Even when answers are compiled, parents will still have questions—don't be discouraged. Peter working now while new parent concern memories are fresh is great (as are his website interests).
18. 37:05 [Dave] Question: Roles & communication How are working groups defined? Should folks report to certain others? Are there expected channels of communication? How should we collaborate?
19. 38:30 [Monica] Communications tend closed to not burden Currently, PTA co-presidents are the first to see incoming email. Co-presidents tend to not share those communications so as to not burden others.
20. 41:20 [Monica] Present recommendations to the PTA Board When suggesting change (and solutions), present them at the PTA Board meeting for the Board and Principal Martin.
21. 42:25 [Peter] Distribute website content updating Should different Board and committee chairs be responsible for updating their information on the website?
22. 43:40 [Monica, John] PTA Board members are busy Defining responsibilities for the Board and committee chair regarding their pieces of the website is good. Recognize though, everyone volunteering is busy and may not be interested in changing/learning new methods or having fun. Don't expect too much from others.
23. 49:50 [Peter] Wordpress tutorials It's easy to show people how to use Wordpress so they can update their website content.
24. 50:50 [John] Improve parent involvement Sagamore can be not only a place parents want to be, but a place they want to get involved in.
25. 51:50 [Dave] Share this discussion Pare down this discussion so everyone can learn a little something about improving Sagamore
26. 52:50 [Peter] Action items We're all on the same page now. Peter will work on a "top ten things new parents can't find", my writing my experience getting enrolled in sagamore, and offering Wordpress tutorials (need email addresses).
27. 54:10 [Dave] Summarize and share Dave will compile the meeting take-aways and share. Sharing will promote involvement.

Resources

https://plus.google.com/events/c1q7onbh0gmctr4bt7jb1mtgjoc

Where this event is coordinated. Allows inviting, rsvp’ing, entering the video conference, watching the video conference live or later, and commenting.

http://www.9.0ne.org/w/State_of_Sagamore_online,_fall_2013

These notes, editable by anyone before and during the video conference. (At https://docs.google.com/document/d/1GyNhkoE1AhHrtMgBRIw9RZ8SWQMZ_jHK1lqvAk8Gzfg/edit during the meeting for real-time collaborative editing)

http://list.9.0ne.org/list/listinfo/sagamore.online

An email discussion list where most discussion should happen.

http://www.9.0ne.org/w/Sagamore_Hills_online

A general repository of knowledge anyone can edit.

Agenda

A rough outline of what we’d like to cover during the video conference. Feel free to add items you’d like covered.

Introductory material

Quick explanation of why we’re here (Dave)

“Welcome to the State of Sagamore Online. It’s 8:30pm, Tuesday, August 20, 2013. We’re parents with children at Sagamore HIlls Elementary School in DeKalb County, Georgia. We’re not the school, we’re not the PTA (yet ☺)—we’re just parents looking to help. We’re here to talk about how the Sagamore community currently communicates online, why, and ideas for the future.”

Short introduction of participants (Dave, Peter, John, …?)

E.g. “I’m Dave Barker. I have a first grader at Sagamore and this is our second year there. I’m a stay at home dad, like to harness the power of technology, and am excited to work on improving online communications at Sagamore.”

“Why this video conference” story (Dave)

“PTA second-year co-president Kim Speece introduced me to Peter—who being an online communications professional and first year Sagamore parent—wanted to talk to me about improvements that could be made in the way Sagamore communicates online. Instead of having that conversation then and there, we decided it’d be best if we had our initial discussion in a recorded video conference, so others could easily join and later refer. Getting each other up to speed would surely produce insights of interest to others—and that’s why we’re here!“

Existing offerings

District site (John)

http://www.dekalb.k12.ga.us/sagamore

• Hosted by DeKalb County Schools and their tech
• Gatekeepers: Principal Martin and ?
• Managed by John Lenz
• Dreamweaver → static upload (?)

PTA site (Dave if no one else)

http://sagamorehillspta.org/

Wordpress, hosted by Dreamhost, needs needs love, managed by PTA, admin keys held by Dave & ?

Parents site (Dave)

http://9.0ne.org/

See: http://www.9.0ne.org/w/Project:About

Ideas

Peter

Here just some initial suggestions

• An email full of ideas
• Put a new RESPONSIVE them on old site, so it shows well on ALL screen sizes, with a navigation that has drop down menus to minimize the space the navigation takes form the pages. Now it is about 30% or so navigation.
• Solicit feedback
  • Add short survey button on side of site - very good to find out what PEOPLE REALLY WANT from the website/ on the website
  • ACTIVELY solicit feedback from parents not only on main website, but also in emails and more.
• FAQ lists, separated on categories, then alpha-sorted

I did a Sagamore information inventory 2013 that could be handy as input. --Dave (talk) 16:18, 21 August 2013 (EDT)

• Media
  • Videos!

I've established a Sagamore Hills PTA Google account that we could lean on. --Dave (talk) 16:18, 21 August 2013 (EDT)

• • More photos, photo-sharing, so all can upload or only webmasters
• Integrate with select social media, of which Youtube.com, pinterest.com and Facebook might be good
• Put BASIC SEO on the site so it shows in Google when people search
• Increase the PTA dues and make the PTA dues a “product” on the coming ecommerce/shopping cart page
• Put a shopping cart page to sell branded Sagamore products but also tickets and fees for various events and activities
• “Experiences” page, where parents can showcase their experience with the school
• Write a page, blog post about 10 things that was hard to find out and how to find them about/when enrolling a new student at Sagamore
• A tag cloud on the first page witht the core values for Sagamore Hills Elementary, can be done at www.wordle.net or other sites.
• Sell SPONSORED SPACE on the website, emails and all other “communication materials/marketing collaterals” that goes out
• Highlight how parents can “easily help contribute buy buying from Sagamore Partners” such as Georga Gas, use the OneCause button and more.

Notes

• New cms screws up branding.
• Monica said there’s a suggestion that the pta website should be folded into the school site?
• Branded email out because of DeKalb County works.
• Sagamore is fair compared to other area websites.
• There was an existing suggestion to fold the content from the pta site into the well branded sagamore site.
• Peter suggested doing a user survey to see what parent really want from a site. webengage.com
• [thinking of reviewing the video and translatin to notes]

Notes are incomplete!