Character, ethos and your school website

This article is about digital ecosystems, or so someone told me. This is because websites are digital ecosystems, full of possibilities. I was told this by someone on social media.

Having taught for a number of years, I remember when they were definitely just websites – in fact I remember when they were paper-based! So when I heard the term “ecosystem” I laughed, but I was wrong.

A website needs to be connected: connected to the students, the staff, the parents, the community, the inspectorate, the world. It offers a guide for us all and a sense of direction for further reading.

The problem is that many websites are often an extension of the paper copies of school documents. We click through the pages as we might a guidebook, and as with any book, where there is no overall narrative we skip to the good bits. If we are searching for a job we read some parts, if we are concerned about our child we read others. It becomes clear the only ones who do not read the guidebook are the ones who feel they do not need it. I hesitate to say it, but this might be the staff.