School Site Joomla Implementation

[rocksolid99]

Hello everyone,

I'm a junior in high school and I've just convinced the staff at our school that Joomla is the way to go for a new site. Our old website is completely disorganized - very hard to browse.

So, after a Joomla demo for the staff, my friend and I have been put in charge of the redesign! I'm very excited, but would appreciate any advice since none of my previous Joomla's really had much riding on them.

Thank you all for your time - Joomla rocks!

[stingrey]

Wow thats great to hear that as student you were able to convince your High School staff to implement such a move.
Then agan looking at the present site, its not too hard to see why 

Good luck on your project

[cozimek]

Ah, good old Valencia.  I used to pass through it on the 5 on the way to the Bay Area from LA.  Congrats on stepping up and making a difference for your school.  They don't even know what a great choice you've made for them.  If you need any guidance and assistance along the way, you've found a home here.

Best of luck!

-Ryan

[eddyyanto]

keep it up, rocksolid99! hope to see http://valenciavikings.com/ a new face. btw, how is the progress ?

[Temprix]

Hello everyone, I'm the other Junior in this project. Our current status is we are meeting up on Sunday and should have a lot of groundwork done before Monday, if all things go as planned. If we have any issues it looks like this would be the place to start looking for solutions. Thanks for the comments already btw!

[MolBio]

Make sure you have your content organized well. I would suggest you to start with the default install and collect all the information about your school.
Think about your navigation system (menu), and what you would like to show on the front page.
Agree with your school staff on menu and other front page modules (calendar or gallery etc.)

I am finishing up Molecular Biology departmental website: http://www.molbio2.princeton.edu that focuses on research, teaching and students. Please look it up, it might be a good example for you.

Good luck with your implementation.

P.S. And yes you are correct – Joomla rocks!

[dquattle]

What module are you using for your top menu on the molecular biology site at Princeton.....very nice is it SW Menu?

[MolBio]

JA Trans Menu V2.0

[Tmcclell]

We are currently CMS shopping for an academic department Web Site (University of Maryland, Department of English) and have placed Joomla on our short list. The Princeton Molecular Biology site looks fantastic! Do you know of any other academic programs using Joomla? If so, would you mind sending the site links? 

How does Joomla compare to Exponent and Drupal?

[stingrey]

Do you know of any other academic programs using Joomla? If so, would you mind sending the site links? 

Just a selection of education related Joomla! powered sites there are literally hundreds:
http://www.newbold.ac.uk/
http://www.onlinelearning.unu.edu/
http://www.doe.vi/
http://www.bakersguide.com/
http://mol-lamp.princeton.edu/joomla/index.php
http://www.privateschooling.co.za/
http://www.rbsd.k12.wi.us/
http://www.msuiit.edu.ph/scs/
http://www.thedustonschool.northants.sch.uk/
http://www.sandownhighschool.com/sandown/
http://www.superior.k12.az.us/
http://fondyhigh.org/
http://www.madisonschools.k12.va.us/
http://www.horizon.ab.ca/
http://www.leesburgyellowjackets.org/
http://www.westwind.ab.ca/

Or just google: joomla schools



I would visit also these sites for other Joomla! powered sites:
http://www.joomla.org/content/blogcategory/35/69/
http://www.joomladirectory.co.uk/joomla.html

[hud]

I would be happy to assist anyone on development of a school based Joomla website.  I was a former technology coordinator for a school district in Indiana, USA.

We have created a mambo-based turnkey school website for public schools and are currently porting everything to Joomla.

I commend the original poster for his interest in improving his school community.  You will find Joomla to be highly flexible and easy for your classmates to assist in updates.  I would suggest that you view all available components and modules and create student teams to take charge of certain key areas.  Example:  one team on news editor/content; one team on photo gallery etc.  By spreading out the development and learning you will create a team atmosphere and quicker "buy in" to this change by your teachers.

I would be willing to share any materials or component manuals, I have written.  Please contact me via my profile link.

Again good job.  As a former educator, I am proud of your effort.

[smartcard]

Where can I download "JA Trans Menu V2.0" ?

[eddyyanto]

here you goes:

http://www.joomlart.com/addons/componen ... mambo.html
But before you download, you need to register there. It's free registration.

[mcsmom]

I have a site for a small school, http://www.manhattancountryschool.org. Joomla works really welll and has lots of good add ons. I use mamblog for teachers to post homework, for example.

I'd really suggest that you sit down and think about who the different users of the site will be and what their needs are. Use paper and pencil to make maps of how you expect them to use the site and try to organize sections and categories that makes it as simple as possible.

Remember, content is more important than looks. Yo u can always make your site look better, but if  the content is not useful to people or they can't find what they want,  the site is no good.

[rocksolid99]

Wow, thanks for all the advice so far!

We're actually rather close to implementation. We're waiting for our tech guy to upload the Joomla! files and the SQL DB to the district server. Then we'll put the majority of the content that is left and touch up the rest (my right nav buttons are a little screwy).

Those files are roughly the equivalent of this, minus a few minor changes.

Any suggestions as to interesting modules to fill up the sides of the homepage? I'm about to go search for a weather module. I remember reading about a flash random picture module which would fade in and out a new picture every few seconds...is there such a thing?

We don't have all our content loaded, yet. We are planning to meet at school either this weekend or after school some day with several friends to do some hardcore copy and pasting from the current site.

Again, thanks for all the advice! The community factor that Joomla! brings is unbeatable.

Edit: Did joomlaya.com die?

[Nimai]

It is very exciting to hear about others working on Joomla sites for their schools.  I've got another thread in here about the Bootster Club (PTA) site I started for my son's elementary school.  I'm hear now to look for more modules to increase the sites' usefulness.  I'm looking for things to help with coordinating volunteering for events, and for online school supply purchasing.

[hud]

Can you explain what your vision for an "Online School Supply Purchasing" component?

Thanks

[Nimai]

Based on input from our Booster Club Treasurer, I am thinking of something as simple as the following:


Items to purchase:
Supplies $5.00
Yearbook $15.00
Eanes directory $10.00
T-shirt  $12.00
Assignment notebook $5.00
Classroom activity fee  $15.00 (we want this pre-selected so they have to click to un-check it.)
[size=120]
TOTAL: $15.00

We will need to allow for one parent to order multiples for their kids, so we need to have  multiple blanks for the kids names, grade level (for supplies) and t-shirt sizes.

Also, we will want the system to be capable of the following:

• Display/email a receipt for each order for the person
• Display/print a master report for booster club president
• Display/print reports by grade level, teacher, alpha order
• Reminder email sent to everyone who ordered supplies the week before back to school to remind them of what they did and didn’t order

I am currently installing VirtueMart on my development site to test drive it.  I read that VirtueMart requires registration for people to use it.  Currently, site registration is only for Booster Club officers, and I don't want the parents all having to register.  My reading also leads me to believe that VirtueMart has some silent registration modes and JACL+ integration might work.  I should know in the next day or so how that all works out.

[mcsmom]

You're going to want people to register. You really don't want a lot of strangers (or mischevious kids) ordering hundreds of t shirts. You can preregister everyone in the school if you want and just send them their passwords.

[Nimai]

I like the idea of pre-registering all of the parents.  I'll see if I can get that list from the school.  Even then, I'm sure there will be some exceptions, but its a good start.

[shaiman]

This is a great thread, I've really gotten a lot out of this.  I am considering starting a business, or joining an existing one, that helps schools put Joomla and Moodle sites up.  I am looking at this as a basic consulting and training gig, with the implementation of the site (and hosting) handled by the school or by a 3rd party.  My goal would be to help a school gather requirements, make a content and content management plan, provide training, etc.  Does anyone know of others in that business. For that matter, what do you think of the need for this service in general.  My research thus far shows that putting up a Joomla site without proper planning and training gets a school a site with lots of pages that are always "under construction".  Any thoughts on this?

[hud]

My company has been working with schools for the past two years implementing a CMS solution using mambo OS as a base.  We are releasing our school product for Joomla in a few months.

We always meet with the school as part of our normal sales activity to introduce the solution and encourage them to create schoolwide teams or web managers to do single tasks (one does events, another photo gallery, etc.) within the admin backend of the site.  The Single Task approach is carried through their training plan.  By the end of training, a faculty member is well trained on their task.  Collectively, these web managers add content to form a highly dynamic site.  We offer sixteen single task manuals to accomplish the tasks and are working with online providers like Web-Ex and software like Captivate to create online training experiences.

These initial meetings and subsequent training have created highly successful sites.  You are correct -  without proper planning and training the site has little chance of success.  But isn't that the way it is with any website whether it depends on CMS or not.  With 20+ years of experience administrating school technology, I feel teachers and tech leaders are too busy to be burdened with HTML driven sites.  Unless they have deep pockets, a web design firm is nearly impossible.  Joomla/mambo and other CMS competitors provide the easiest solution to school websites.  However, I stress all CMS products can not solve the web problem without four items:  Community Buy-In, Planned implementation, exceptional training, and continual evaluation and support.

My long two cents

[AmyStephen]

I have been looking at Moodle to try to integrate it with Joomla for our school district. Anyone have experience with pulling these two products together?

[hud]

We haven't worked on integration only external linking.  It is on our list for later.  Here are some resources.

moodle - mambo integration:  http://download.moodle.org/modules/integrations.php

discussion:  http://moodle.org/mod/forum/discuss.php?d=20080

Search both mambo/joomla forums for references to moodle.

[AmyStephen]

Yup, got those marked earlier. Moodle is a very nice Course Management System -- an SIS system is also needed. I have found a few "startup" open source projects but nothing full blown, yet. Here's a good link evaluating commercial and open solutions in the UK: http://schoolforge.org.uk/index.php/Man ... on_Systems

Good luck with your project; looks like you have a great start.

Your picture is scaring me, tho! Are you in a witness protection program? lol

[hud]

Amy - Wow.  Great link.  Thanks very much.  A wealth of information and thought is here.

There is so much work to be done on the integration of CMS with student data systems.  All school districts in my area have multiple data system vendors.  However the SIF compatibility is expected and moving along nicely between those vendors.  We are exploring this connectivity during our summer development retreat. 

Would you like a smiley face drawn on the avatar?   

[AmyStephen]

Do you spend time here: http://www.sifinfo.org/ ? It looks like a good site, as well.

As far as your avatar...don't need to smile, you are probably a busy, stressed out person. But, we need to see your eyes.  So, I think a couple of eye balls on there and it won't be so scary.

Maybe you are a famous person trying to lay low?

[hud]

Yes, this is the SIF site.  It is quite pricey to get the SIF stamp and I swim in their specs, but we feel it is an important stamp that would enable our project to continue growing.


Busy, yes.  Stressed, I gave it up on my way to middle age.  Famous person, hmmmmmmmmmmmm.

[AmyStephen]

Famous person, hmmmmmmmmmmmm.

I KNEW it!

see ya around.

[Maxilla]

hello...

waaaaaaaa~* 

Happy to see this thread.. it really helps me gather information and ideas for using Joomla for building a school website. Well I made a thread.. and at first i didnt noticed that there were already a sub School and University Category thread in the forum, good thing one of the mod.. moved it here.. and thus helping me to view more relevant threads.

Well.. I got the details of what kind of school website Im going to make, in my thread in this subtopic, in other words, I'm planning to make more like a student oriented website, rather than an official one. (since in my country, having a official one, means the content are usually static and are controlled due to the Ministry provision) so.. since I'm planning a dynamic website.. I gotta rebel a lil bit.. and make my school a website.. under my club, ICT Club (registered under my school).

Hmm.. one thing that bugs me most is finding a suitable template that is versitle.. I can do some heavy customisation to a template, but only on graphic, not coding (using photoshop). I like this basic design used in this website: http://www.newbold.ac.uk/ I can just make a customise header picture and a little of color schemming. Or does anyone have a better ideas? Love to hear them..

Themes that I'm going to use on the coming website, Elegant and Simple, optimized for 1024x768 (also planning to put some module in the front page like calender, shoutbox; so i need some space to put that in)

Anyway.. I want to hear people's opinion on this.. heheh 

Cheers!