Plainfield School District Launches New Teacher Websites

Last winter, District 202 unveiled a new website. Now, starting next week, parents will be able to access teachers’ personalized websites, allowing them to see what’s happening in their students’ classrooms without leaving home.

District 202 on Wednesday announced that it will activate a new system of personalized teacher sites through the Edline System for Blackboard on Tuesday, Sept. 30.

The district partnered with host site Blackboard last school year after security issues including a breach that allowed a Joliet teen to send profane emails to 23,000 District 202 job applicants in 2012, and a glitch that gave students access to previously blocked sites like YouTube.

The deal with Blackboard cost the district $99,504.94 for the first year and $86,204.94 per year for the following two years.

In a press release, Community Relations Director Tom Hernandez said the new personalized teacher websites will be a “’one stop communications shop’ designed to improve communications between teachers and parents, increase access to and use of technology in the classroom and extend the classroom experience for students.”

The classroom website launch comes after nearly two years of work, Hernandez said, ncluding building and implementing 31 district and school web sites on the same Blackboard platform and buying new laptops for every teacher to allow for more mobility.

“This new tool is part of our work to find new ways to connect our parents, teachers and students through technology,” said Superintendent of Schools Dr. Lane Abrell. “Our teachers are very excited about this great new opportunity, and we’re anxious to see how they use it in their classrooms.”

According to Hernandez, about 1,400 certified staff members — mainly classroom teachers — were trained on the new system in June and have been working since then to build their sites. All of the district’s approximately 1,850 teachers will be trained on the system by Oct. 31. Some teachers may opt to create websites later in relation to other district initiatives, Hernandez said.

“Utilizing Blackboard in this pilot year is an exciting opportunity that connects teachers and parents through technology,” Dawn Bullock, president of the Association of Plainfield Teachers, said in a press release.

On Tuesday, parents will receive activation codes that will allow them to access websites for their students’ teachers.

On the sites, teachers can post classroom information including:

• Contact information

• Class work

• Student photos

• Class calendars

• Homework

• Learning resources

• Online communications tools (blogs, surveys, etc.)

• Links to middle and high school students’ grades

Content may vary based on grade level and each teacher’s preference.

“This is going to be a work in progress for a while, and we hope our parents will be patient as teachers work to make their sites as helpful as possible,” Abrell said.

Find more information on Blackboard/Edline on District 202’s website.