School District Website Gets a Redesign

This year the Commack Union Free Schools District's site will be updated to include more web-based information for parents and residents.

The district uses their website to inform parents of all school activities. They are a "green" district because of these efforts to reduce ink, cost of postage and paper in the past year. 

Brenda Lentsch, school spokeswoman, designed the site in 2003. Over the years, Lentsch has updated it in several batches. This year's "facelift" will give the site a new look and a new feel.

"I redesigned the Intranet, for staff use, last summer with a more intuitive and informative structure. I am working on the public site this summer," Lentsch said.

The public site includes all the information you see by visiting their homepage – including the backpack news section, directory, information about the individual schools and community events page. The site, Lentsch said, contains more than 2,000 pages.

"I have redesigned it based on user statistics that track usage and downloads. I gathered suggestions from parents and administrators. Links to pages and features that are most frequently requested will be easily accessible. I hope to launch the updated site mid-summer," Lentsch said.

The efforts to reduce costs and go green began in April of 2009, with the "backpack news" section of the website, said Lentsch.

"We began 'backpack news' with a section for each school, their Parent-Teacher Associations and Special Education Parent-Teacher Association. We then made it available to outside organizations, like Boy Scouts, etc. The community can also request postings on our Community Events page," Lentsch said.

For the first time, in June 2009, parents were notified of all back to school information via the Commack schools website. Confidential information – class schedule, assignment, locker assignment and emergency contact card – was the only type of information mailed home for the 2009-2010 school year. It was, Lentsch said, a success.

"Parents receive reminders to check the backpack page and we have heard that it has really cut down on the piles of paper in our families' homes, especially those with more than one child," Lentsch said.

The school district saved $10,000 for the 2009-2010 school year in printing costs and also "saved a considerable amount of trees," Lentsch said.