Web sites and IT services for schools, start-up and small business, councils and other organizations. Friendly humans. Plain English spoken!
See a few examples of our award winning school web sites at:
Arrowscape believes that every school, even the smallest, deserves a top-quality, professional looking, easy to navigate, interesting and vibrant web site that truly reflects the image and ethos of the school.
Unlike some companies, we don't work with limited templates - every one of our school web sites is uniquely developed for each individual school.
School web sites come in all shapes and sizes, and range from the very good to the downright bad. All too often we have seen sites that really do no justice to the school. These are sometimes designed by parents, teachers or even pupils. Whilst we applaud the efforts made by these people, who generally give their time voluntarily, the end result can frequently be a let down. The Headteacher and Governors may then be reluctant to put their full strength behind the promotion of the site, which often means it will 'sit there' on the web, attracting very few visitors and not being used to its fullest extent.
By working in partnership with you, Arrowscape ensure that every school receives a great-value, first-class web site and an on-going support service second-to-none.
We come and visit you at school to sit down and discuss exactly what you would like to see in your web site. Obviously, we have lots of ideas that stem from our experience in designing previous sites and our extensive research, but the main objective is to ensure your web site provides exactly what you want from it.
Another purpose of the visit may be to take digital photographs in and around school for use on the web site, although many schools have their own digital cameras these days, and like to do this in their own time.
Every web site is enhanced by the careful use of photographs. We would generally expect to see photos of the school building, grounds, classrooms, work done by the children, and so on. Pictures of a school without any children in it do look somewhat strange!
If you already have actual photographs that you would like to include on your web site, we can happily scan them for you.
After the visit, we will produce a detailed summary of everything we have discussed. This report will give you a flavour of the finished design of your site, will show you the structure of the site (what the individual web pages will be called, and where they will be) and will serve as a reminder of the content that you have agreed to provide.
Whilst Arrowscape can put together your site in terms of design and structure, a lot of the content (i.e. the actual 'words' on the pages) can only be written by persons from school.
During the initial visit, we will agree with you exactly who is going to provide us with this content. To save duplicating effort, you might find that a lot of the content for the web site can be taken directly from an existing school prospectus or brochure. If this is the case, it will save you more time.
Most schools already have an Internet Service Provider, often arranged by their LEA for the area as a whole. Regardless of who your ISP is, Arrowscape will liaise with them to ensure space is available to host your web site. Then, when the time comes, we will work with them to put your site onto the 'live' Internet.
Whether you realise it or not, your school already has already been allocated its very own domain name! In Birmingham, for example, it is likely to be of the format: www.<schoolname>.bham.sch.uk
Once you have provided all the necessary content for the web site, and once we have incorporated it into the site and made it 'live', you can have a period to check through everything and make sure it is complete and accurate.
Any errors or omissions or modifications can be passed to us, and we will change it accordingly. You might want to get other staff, or school governors, to check through the site with you so they, too, begin to get familiar with the web.
Search Engines are frequently used by web surfers to find sites when then don't know the exact address (URL). They put a few keywords in, such as 'primary' 'school' 'birmingham' and see what the Search Engine returns. Whilst it is not absolutely vital to be registered with these sites, it is a good way to generate more visitors to your web site.
On your behalf, Arrowscape will submit your site details to the top free Search Engines in the expectation that you will eventually get added to their databases. This will save you a good deal of worry, since it can be a time consuming process.
This is where Arrowscape really soars above the service provided by other web developers.
It is vitally important that your web site, once live, remains up-to-date. There is nothing worse that seeing a web site that has not been updated for months, even years. Web surfers are fickle people - if they visit your web site a second time and see that it is out of date, they will not visit again.
Included with our web site package is a whole year of updates. This means that, at any time, you can send updated information to us and we will amend your web site accordingly.
After the end of the first year, the vast majority of our schools choose to retain us (at a very modest fee) to continue looking after the web site for future years. They're so pleased with the service we provide, and they simply don't have to worry about having the skills and time to update the web site themselves.
Some schools do want member(s) of their staff to take control of the web updates themselves. If this is the case, we will be pleased to come along and train one or more members of staff on how to update your web site. You can then simply book a training day with us, and we will come and show you how everything works. From that day onwards you will be able to update your own web site whenever you want.
Of course, we will still be here to provide you with support. We will not just 'leave you to it', since we realise how important it is have help when you need it. You can call us whenever you need assistance on any aspect of updating your web site, or to discuss ideas on evolving the site.
Arrowscape pride ourselves on providing a first class service to our customers, which always includes after care and on-going support. This is one of the reasons why our existing customers are so happy to recommend us.
See a few examples of our award winning school web sites at:
You, too, could have a school web site as professional and easy-to-use as The Coppice, The Pochin, or Ward End for just £995!
PLEASE ASK FOR OUR INFORMATION PACK, WHICH INCLUDES A VERY HELPFUL FACT SHEET TO AID HEADTEACHERS OR ICT CO-ORDINATORS WHO ARE CONSIDERING THE DEVELOPMENT OF A SCHOOL WEB SITE.
For further information, or to discuss any aspects of the services detailed above, don't hesitate to call Tony on 01527 455001.
01527 455001
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