Did you know it takes about 0.05 seconds for a user to determine whether they choose to stay on, or leave your website? You heard it right! 

Though it’s a common saying, “do not judge a book by its cover”, when it comes to your website design, it is almost always subjected to an extreme level of snap judgment that may influence any perceptions of credibility.

If you are new to website design or are unsure about what will make an impact and help to increase parental engagement for your school’s website, here are some basic design mistakes that you should avoid.

1. Using stock photos

Photography is one of the most critical elements of good school website design. Using stock photos or bad quality images can dramatically impact the value associated with your school website. If you intend to use stock photos at all, then make sure they are of high quality and realistically express the emotions you have in mind.

2. Too many menu items

Researchers have concluded that when too many menus or options are given to users, the human mind tends to get confused and is not able to take the required action. Not something you want to happen with your school website.

For example, if your website has too many menus on multiple parts of your web page or multiple dropdowns under each heading, it is less likely that your user, in this case, the students or parents, will find the information they need. In such cases, the user will quickly skim through the menus or sections and will immediately leave the page if they cannot locate the appropriate information.

Related to menu items, there is another design mistake that often needs the designer’s attention — invisible navigation menus. If the visual cues are missing from the breadcrumbs, your user may struggle to find where exactly they are on the website or where they want to go next.  

3. Long pages

A school website serves many audiences — alumni, teachers, current parents, students, and prospective parents. The competing needs of the different types of audience compel many schools to overload their website with too much information that often extends to several pages and needs to be scrolled to access the complete information. This often leads to the parents missing out on critical information and causing a lot of confusion.

When building pages on your website, you need to use the most relevant and important information that must be conveyed and offer an option to either download a PDF for more information or contact the school to have queries resolved.

4. Keeping old / no longer relevant content

Continuing from the above point, keeping content that could be archived is one critical mistake website admins often make.  Content should be focused primarily on the current requirements of the target audience. Other information, for example, news and updates dating back several years, doesn’t hold relevance for current parents and should be removed and updated from time to time. 

5. Not being mobile responsive

According to Statista, until January 2021, the total number of active mobile internet users in the UK was approximately 65.32 million.

The most common mistake made by many designers is that they design a school website keeping in mind only the desktop version and bringing in the mobile version as an afterthought. Clearly, if you do not design a website keeping the mobile view in mind, you’re definitely ignoring a major portion of the audience and site traffic.

Instead, you should evenly weigh your desktop and mobile view considerations from the start of the project, this will definitely improve the user experience on your school website. Even the new mobile-friendly algorithm from Google provides an additional boost in your website rankings if it is mobile-friendly.

6. An old design

School website design has moved on a lot in the last few years. Ordinary home pages are oh-so-boring and outdated. Some designers also make the mistake of working on the design and the website copy separately. Designing the website first or creating the copy? This is kind of that world’s chicken and egg kind of question — who came first?

When looking for a design, make sure you choose something that stays relevant to the times and choose a theme template that has a modern look and feel. Making the site effective is more important than just focusing on the beauty aspect of the site. Text-heavy pages are a big no-no and over usage of graphics isn’t recommended either.

Another advantage of modern themes is that they also come with user-friendly navigation which helps both the parents and students to easily access information without worrying about what to click next.

7. Image resolutions too high or too low

Photos or images are an integral part of the website design process but if the image resolution is too high or too low, that can have an opposite impact on the user experience. 

When uploading images to your site, you should always look at the pixel dimensions. For a horizontal image, you should use at least 1024 pixels and the standard resolution for web images, also known as screen resolution, should be 72PPI. 

8. Too many images in slideshows

You might have seen many websites that have attractive images as slide shows or carousels, they might look really appealing, but they can detract from the crucial information you want your website users to find.

The Usability Guru, Jakob Nielsen, performed a test on a couple of users where he asked them to spot a particular deal on washing machines which was mentioned in one of the most prominent slides on a site – due to the number of slideshow images, most of the users missed that information. Thereafter, he concluded that image carousels get ignored. Notre Dame also performed a similar test and the result got them 1% action only on the first slide.

Even in the case of school websites, parents or students really do not have sufficient time to scroll through hundreds of images to find one specific piece of information. 

9. Avoid bright or hard to read colors for text

As rightly said by Tim Berners-Lee, the inventor of the Web, “The power of the Web is in its universality. Access by everyone regardless of disability is an essential aspect.”

Some of the most common accessibility mistakes that you can make when choosing a website design include background and font colour combinations, not providing a visual focus on certain elements on the website, missing alt text on images, or including link text that does not provide sufficient detail.

When you choose your next website design, pick a company that has incorporated web accessibility in its platform.

10. Overuse of scrolling text and animations

When the question of adding animations to website design comes, contemporary users like you might instantly like the idea of seeing some movement on the website and hence adding animations. Now if the animations are user-triggered then it does a good job in bringing in the desired impact. But using too many animations or movements could negatively impact the functionality of the website by slowing it down, and especially so when you open it on your mobile devices.

Again, additional and unintentional horizontal scrollbars that often pop up in otherwise responsive websites can also ruin the look and feel of the website and can slow it down tremendously.

Final thoughts

While designing a school website, it is critical to always keep your target audience and brand image in mind in every step of the design process. If you can reconcile the two, you will have a beautiful product that will be loved by all.

Designing a school website or any other educational software undoubtedly requires thorough expertise and relevant experience and with School Jotter guiding you every step of the way, you can get your website or app up in no time. Contact us right away to discuss how we can help you bring your vision to life.

Ensuring your school’s website is mobile-friendly is more important than ever for the new academic year.  But what does that actually mean, why does it matter and how can you get it for your school?

What is a mobile-friendly website?

Making your site-mobile friendly simply means ensuring that your existing website will shrink down when it’s viewed on a mobile-device, e.g. a smartphone or tablet. All important information, contact info, key pages, images and even videos or animations, should be easily readable in this smaller format, and your design should translate well to mobile too.

Why is a mobile-friendly website important for schools?

More searches on mobile:

With searches on mobile devices having overtaken desktop for many years now, you want to make sure that all-important information about your school, whether for existing parents, or potential new families, is all available with ease.

Visibility on search engines:

For the last few years Google’s search algorithms have given great prominence to sites which are mobile-friendly, so a mobile-friendly web design could mean you appear higher in search results. This could be particularly important at this time of year, as parents are potentially looking for schools to send their children to. 

How can I check if my school’s website is mobile-friendly?

Google’s own Mobile-Friendly Test is the quickest and easiest way to see if Google considers your web design to be suitable for mobile users. You simply enter your web address, and within a few moments Google will run a test on your site and present you with your results. Your website will be determined to be mobile-friendly (or not) and you will be given additional resources and information to learn more about the subject.

In addition to this it’s also worth taking a look at the website yourself on your own device, and consider, can you see and read all of your important information clearly.

What if my school failed the mobile-friendly test?

At this stage it’s important for you to speak to your website developers. If you haven’t had a new design for several years, then you should seriously consider investing in one to help make it easier for parents to see all the good things your school does.

Depending on the complexity of the design you want, a new website can take anywhere from just a few days, to several months to complete, but moving forwards, you should have a website that is much more accessible for more people.

If you’d like to find out more about a mobile-friendly website for your school

Our team of experts would be happy to help.  Contact us and a member of our team will call you back.

Your website provides a vital link between staff and parents, school and home – or at least it should. There are so many templates schools can use to build a website quickly and easily but many of these could be outdated. They can often look old-fashioned and may be hard for parents to find their way around. So if you’re considering a new website for your school, how can you make sure to build a site that you can be proud of? Here are five key factors to consider. 

Web statistics

Why do people come to your website? Website statistics tell you how many visitors you’ve had, which pages they visited, how long they’ve spent on each page and much more. Once you know what people are looking for, you can make sure key information is easy to access. But you can only do that when you know the stats – so make sure your website design company offers access to them and presents them in an easy-to-understand way (Webanywhere does this! [https://www.schooljotter.com/school-websites/]). Use this data to identify the information that is viewed the most and structure your website in relation to the traffic – reducing click rate.

Easy navigation

There’s nothing more frustrating than a website with poor navigation, especially when you’re using your smartphone or tablet. If we can’t find what we want straight away, we generally give up and go elsewhere. This is the same for parents, if they can’t find something in 3 clicks or less, they are likely to get frustrated and call the school office for information. Make sure you have a simple navigation structure that makes it easy to find key information. Again, choose a web design company like Webanywhere who provide simple, straightforward navigation tools.

Keep it ‘above the fold’

Imagine a newspaper, folded in half. Where does the editor put the biggest, most important headline? On the top half of the front page, above the fold … And that’s the most important area of your website too. Think about what you want visitors to do when they land on your site – subscribe to a newsletter, request a prospectus, download a form? Put that CTA – call to action – on the top half of your homepage, and it’s the first thing people see – and the first thing they are likely to do. 

Keep it updated

There’s nothing worse than being out of date, yet so many schools’ websites look like they’ve not been updated for years. A fresh, modern design using your school colours and badge gives visitors a great first impression. It’s not all about looks though – make sure your key information, like contact details, staff directories and term dates, are up to date too. It’s also vital to keep updated with ofsted requirements, such as keeping evidence of current and previous curriculum – a website is the perfect tool for this.

Encourage repeat visits

Finally, encourage people to visit the website by adding new content on a regular basis. Newsletters, field trip reports, photo galleries, a calendar and a blog all help you connect with parents and keep people coming back. 

Your school website provides the first impression to potential pupils, and it’s also a requirement to make sure it’s complying with Ofsted standards.
Ofsted will often review a school’s website as part of their inspection, so it’s essential to ensure it’s up to date, easy to use and appealing to visitors.
To help you reach the high standards inspectors look for, here’s a handy checklist of things to do to make sure your school website is the best it can be.

Your school’s name, contact details and ethos

Communication is key, and easy contact between parents and the school is something Ofsted will look for. Make sure your website’s got:

• Your school’s name presented clearly
• The ethos, aims and values of your school
• Postal address
• Telephone number
• Name and contact details of your headteacher
• Name and address of the chair of the governing body
• Name and contact details of the member of staff who deals with queries from parents and members of the public
• Name and contact details of your special educational needs coordinator

Your school’s admission process

It sounds obvious, but you need to tell people how to apply for your school in a simple and concise way. There’s no point confusing potential parents and pupils; it’ll just turn them away from your school. Be sure to include:

• Your selection criteria
• Your school’s admissions number
• Details on arrangements for disabled students
• How parents can apply
• Details of your oversubscription criteria

Behaviour and suspension/exclusion policies

Ofsted wants to see that your school can both teach and discipline students. Include:

• Your school’s behaviour and bullying policies. Also make sure they comply with section 89 of the Education and Inspections Act 2006
• Details of your school’s exclusion policy

Equality and accessibility objectives

A school should be an environment in which everyone should feel welcome and like they can succeed. Make sure you’re laying out a clear plan on how you’re making students of all ethnicities, sexualities, genders and backgrounds welcome.

• How your school is fighting discrimination
• Your school’s equality objectives
• How your school complies with the public sector equality duty
• How disabled students are involved and helped in the curriculum
• How your school provides physical access to disabled students

Performance tables

You have to advertise your school and tell people why they should send their children there. There’s no better way to do that than showing the quality of education parents can expect.

• Key stage 1+2 results – average standards of reading, writing and maths as well as the percentage of students who have achieved higher scores
• Key stage 4 results – percentage of students who have achieved a grade of C or above in English and Maths. Also, include the percentage of students who have gone onto higher education, training or employment
• Link to national performance tables

Content management apps such as School Jotter can be a great tool to help make sure your website is up to date and complying with Ofsted standards. School Jotter can help you create and manage your website in a streamlined way, so you’ll easily be able to make a website that’s both appealing and easy to use for parents, pupils and other members of the public, but also will get you a good score from Ofsted.
For a more extensive checklist on extra things you can do to improve your school website, have a look at this.

Schools need funding. It’s a fact which transcends politics; when you’re dealing with our children’s futures and the security of the next generation, you need to make sure they have all the resources they need to succeed.
That’s why fundraising is so essential to the quality and upkeep of schools. With inadequate government funding, it often comes down to the parents to prop up their local schools, and even a small donation can go a long way.
However, it’s not as simple as just asking people to give you money. Schools need to make sure that when raising funds, you’re being accessible and understanding.
So take a look at your website. Is it easy to navigate? Is it welcoming and easy on the eyes? Does it have all the information a visitor might need to be presented in a digestible way?
Creating relationships with your pupils’ parents is important, and in the modern age of the internet, a school website is often the first thing a mum or dad will see. Make sure you’re giving a great first impression.

Make sure your website operates cross-platform

The best websites have a design which works across multiple platforms. If parents are using their phones or tablets, they need to be able to navigate around your website just as well as if they’re on the computer. If your goal is to raise money, after all, you have to take into account that people – especially parents – are busy and always on the go, so might not have a laptop on hand.
There’s nothing worse than a website which is poorly formatted for a smaller screen. It’s instantly off putting and aggravating to visitors if they don’t have immediate access to a computer screen.

Use content management systems like School Jotter

School Jotter is an ideal app for schools trying to improve their website. Used by over 3000 schools nationwide, School Jotter can help you create a unique website customised with features that suit your needs. Have you ever seen a website that has left you impressed with its design, and makes you want to keep clicking? That should be the aim for any school website to entice students and potential donors.
School Jotter isn’t just for website creation, either. You can make school surveys, polls, quizzes and even content to help improve your pupils’ spelling.

Organise fundraising events

Fundraising isn’t just about parents sending you money through a website. To truly engage with parents you want to go above and beyond, and with applications like School Jotter you can organise events online. The app for phone can send notifications, too, so it’s a lot more convenient than sending out newsletters every month or trusting the kids to tell their parents!
Want to host a fundraising event at the school? Put it on your website and it’ll automatically update to the School Jotter app, so your pupils will never miss a beat. Some schools try to get creative with their fundraisers, and it’s something parents appreciate. Go the extra mile in your events: maybe a Britain’s Got Talent-themed talent competition, a Halloween costume contest, or even a cook-off. The more you appeal to your pupils and their parents, the more successful your fundraisers will be.
So, make sure you’re not neglecting your school’s online presence. In a world where we spend on average 24 hours a week online, schools have to adapt with and take advantage of the vast changes to how we communicate with each other. Used well, you can increase admissions and donations to better the education of the next generation.

The humble mobile app has transformed numerous aspects of daily life.
Our social media apps give us the freedom to chat with people all over the world in seconds. Our banking apps let us manage our finances at any time, any place. And gaming apps keep us entertained on buses, trains and in waiting rooms.
But school mobile apps have even more to offer: they provide schools with streamlined ways to stay on schedule, communicate with parents and educate pupils via interactive tools. Any designed to help pupils learn may be downloaded on a parent or teacher’s smartphone as an educational aid.
Many school mobile apps are available today, so how do you know which are the best?
We’ve picked the top 8 below.

#1. School Jotter – School Web Design and Mobile App

School Jotter’s CMS is a complete solution for schools, empowering you with the means to update your website, add content, advertise vacancies, manage CVs, communicate with staff through text messages and more.
The School Jotter mobile app is an excellent complement to the CMS, providing parents with various features and information. They can:

• keep up to date with the latest school events
• view calendars
• read newsletters
• check out galleries
• view maps
• see what homework has been set
• complete forms on the school website
• take part in surveys
• book appointments for parents’ evenings
• send free instant messages

This helps parents stay informed of their children’s school’s latest events, keep in touch with teachers and much more.

#2. Duolingo

Educating primary-school children on a second language can be a real challenge, but Duolingo helps to make it simpler.
It has been called the ‘best language-learning app’ by The Wall Street Journal and is (perhaps best of all) free! Duolingo is designed to help users learn multiple languages, including:

• English
• Spanish
• French
• German
• Italian
• Dutch
• Russian

Duolingo makes learning new languages fun and interactive, utilising quizzes and bite-size lessons. This school mobile app is available on Google Play and iTunes.

#3. My Study Life

Staying on top of homework, exams and special occasions at school is difficult for young children, but My Study Life aims to change that.
This isn’t just a calendar app — you can use it to:

• see when work is due
• view when exams will take place
• set reminders for classes and unfinished work
• create timetables to reduce the risk of missed deadlines

My Study Life is a helpful app for schools, helping staff and pupils alike stay focused on tasks without confusing dates or classes. It’s available on Google Play and iTunes.

#4. Khan Academy

This free app is well worth looking into, providing access to a huge catalogue of videos and other learning resources across many subject areas.
You can use Khan Academy to:

• watch over 10,000 videos and explanations on maths, economics, history, science and more
• make education more interactive with over 40,000 questions
• try exercises and read articles on countless topics

Khan Academy gives teachers and children a vast catalogue of information, serving as an educational aid when studying a huge range of subjects. Achievements can be unlocked for a touch of gamification too, helping to engage pupils.
It’s available for download from iTunes only.

#5. Quizlet

Quizlet is a learning app based around flashcards, with multiple functions. This can be used by pupils as an aid to learning and practicing for tests through all years of primary school, as well as for teachers brushing up on subjects.
Quizlet offers the following features:

• prepare for tests and exams with the Learn section
• check your memory using Write
• share flashcards with other users
• implement custom audio and images to reinforce learning

Quizlet is free for the first seven days of usage, and multiple paid versions are available with additional functions. You can download it from iTunes and Google Play.

#6. WolframAlpha

WolframAlpha refers to itself as a real-life counterpart to the powerful computers seen on Star Trek, offering information on a massive variety of subjects using cutting-edge algorithms to create answers / reports.
Apple’s Siri is used in some aspects of WolframAlpha. This app can help with:

• elementary maths
• algebra
• astronomy
• geology
• animals
• plants
• dinosaurs
• climate
• calendars
• weather
• geography
• oceans
• historical figures
• linguistics

And much more!
WolframAlpha is an impressive school mobile app that to benefit teachers in the classroom and pupils at home. It’s not free, but its low cost and real potential makes it a worthy investment.
You can find it on Google Play and iTunes.

#7. Math Motion: Cupcake!

Many children struggle to learn maths, even at the most basic levels. Not only is the work itself difficult, but just the prospect of studying maths can be incredibly intimidating.
Math Motion: Cupcake! is a colourful, fun mobile app designed to help pupils develop their maths skills by running a cupcake business. It educates through such tasks as:

• fulfilling orders
• working out the cost of every cupcake
• paying loans back

Math Motion: Cupcake! shows how important maths is in everyday life in a practical, more engaging way. This app is available on iTunes only, for a modest price.

#8. Star Walk

Space is a fascinating subject to study at any age, but particularly in primary school. Today’s children have access to countless exciting resources on space, stars and astronomy, and Star Walk is a great way to help them learn.
Using Star Walk, you can explore the sky in real time, identifying planets and constellations using just a smartphone. It allows you to:

• locate and discover facts about celestial bodies
• study an astronomical calendar to find when eclipses, meteor showers, full moons and more will occur
• use the Time Machine feature to look at sky maps of the past and future
• explore the night sky with Night mode, making the app more comfortable to use

Many more features and functions are included, making Star Walk an indispensable aid to educating children on astronomy. It requires no internet connection.
You can download Star Walk from iTunes and Google Play for a small cost.

Each of these school mobile apps can help teachers, pupils and parents in a specific way, whether that’s building a reliable schedule, exploring historical events or even learning another language.
They’re simple to use and compatible with an extensive range of devices. Prices are generally kept low too, to suit schools on diverse budgets.
Have you used any of these apps, or do you have others to recommend? Let us know below!

Every parent wants to send their child to the best primary school, but how do they know which will help get their little one’s education off to a great start?
Research is a crucial part of the selection process, and school websites are a common first port of call. All primary schools must invest in a polished, professional site that both makes a powerful first impression on parents and provides a competitive edge over other local schools.
Choosing the right company to build your website is essential — and below, we explore what factors make the best school website design providers.

The provider must understand your school’s individual needs

A great website design provider works closely with clients, to gain a clear insight into the primary school’s goals, character and values. The more the team knows about a school and its ethos, the better it can represent them online.
Of course, there are certain fundamental elements of website design that work brilliantly for all primary schools. These include:

• Simple, user-friendly navigation
• A personal welcome from the headteacher to build trust
• Information on what makes the school unique
• A clear menu structure
• Educational resources (performance in league tables, assessment results etc.)
• A guide to the school’s values and goals
• A welcoming tone / personality
• Contact details
• Fast load times, especially on mobile devices
• Responsive design
• Quality images and videos

However, each of these factors has to be incorporated into the school website in an organic but relevant way. No two school sites should be identical.
Asking questions and listening to the school’s leaders is vital: a reliable web design provider will have a true passion for satisfying the client.

A portfolio of live websites is key

Working with an experienced primary school website design provider will help you attract parents and should have a selection of live sites to show you. If they don’t, you’re right to be wary.
This is the same as hiring an artist with no completed paintings or a baker without any cakes to prove their talent: you want to trust that the people you’re employing know what they’re doing.
Reviewing the company’s previous work is a simpler, faster way to assess their credentials than reading a lengthy proposal. Even if it’s a brand new provider, they should have example non-client sites they created to demonstrate their skills.
Take time to explore the live sites and pay attention to your user experience. Was the website well-organised and easy to use? Was there plenty of valuable information and visual content?
Only choose a provider you genuinely feel satisfied with. Don’t be pressured into a decision or go for the cheapest option.

Practical experience matters

Following on from the above, good experience is just as important as a solid portfolio. The more primary schools the provider has worked with, the better their service is likely to be.
Why? Because they’ll have a stronger grasp of what constitutes a great school site. They’ll be well-versed in important elements of education-website design. And, because they’ll know just how crucial it is to sell your school as the best choice for parents.
Any prospective provider you’re considering should be transparent about its background and previous clients. The team may present testimonials on their website and be happy for you to contact schools they worked with in the past.
Speaking to former clients provides reassurance and helps you judge the company’s suitability.

Your primary school website designers should have a strong online presence

Just as your primary school needs an online presence, so too does your prospective website design provider.
Be wary of any team that offers no contact details or a physical address; if they invite communications through an online submission form only, that could mean they will be hard to reach in the future.
And that’s unacceptable if you find your primary school website isn’t working right — or is down altogether — one morning.
Make sure your chosen company is dedicated to great customer service and offers responsive support in the event of any technical problems.

Focus on the latest tools and techniques

When you hire professionals to build your primary school website, you expect professional results. And reliable website design providers should leverage the latest software, tools and platforms to maximise their performance.
Of course, they need to understand that you may not grasp what their work involves and be willing to talk you through it in a clear, accessible way. You should be made aware of their plans for your site, their progress, their schedule and any other important points.
Ideally, your provider will be keen to keep you in the loop and ensure your school website meets your specifications beautifully. If your site doesn’t align with your school’s needs, how do you expect it to attract parents?
A good provider will build a responsive website that offers all the information and resources people need to gauge your school’s suitability for their child.

A complete end-to-end service

At Webanywhere, our expert team has built outstanding websites for many primary schools, delivering bespoke services tailored to each client’s unique needs. Thousands of schools have benefitted from our services since 2003, and we’re happy to work around your own schedule for maximum convenience.
We never charge by the hour for support or consultation. We have the tools, the training and the drive to take your primary school website from the initial design stage to launch — and beyond! Webanywhere’s team will keep your site live and updated for years to come.
Our developers will enhance all content on your site for optimal impact on users and search engines alike, helping your school reach the right people. It’s an exciting process and you’ll stay fully-informed throughout, for your complete peace of mind. We always take quality service seriously, and are committed to 100% satisfaction.
Do you want to learn more about Webanywhere’s bespoke primary school website design? Just click below to get in touch!

One of the most difficult decisions parents make is choosing which school their children will attend.
We all want the best for our little ones. We all want to know they’re learning in a safe, productive environment that will help cultivate their development and, ultimately, give them the right skills to build a successful future.
Researching any school your child may be able to attend is a crucial step, and the first port of call for the majority of parents is the school’s website — which is why it’s so important to get it right.
A website is a school’s chance to essentially shake the parent’s hand and prove why it’s the perfect option. Building a responsive school website is essential to deliver the best browsing experience and demonstrate everything that makes your school special.
But what does that mean and how can it be achieved?
In this guide, we’ll explore the power of responsive school website design, beginning with the basics.

What is Responsive Design?

Responsive Web Design (RWD) is an approach to crafting websites that provide a high-quality experience across multiple devices. We live in a world of 24/7 connectivity now: we’re not just browsing the internet at our desks anymore — our smartphones and tablets allow us to go online at any time, any place.
As the number of searches performed on handsets has overtaken those through desktops, websites have to perform to a high standard on any screen a visitor may use. Responsive Web Design focuses on running a single site incorporating elements which respond in a different way to suit the device in question.
An old-fashioned website might be made primarily to fit large monitors but is totally unaccommodating for mobile users. For example, if a page displays a table containing multiple blocks of data, this would have to be adapted to suit a smaller screen to prevent a cumbersome layout. Anyone trying to scroll across the page to read the table’s contents could become frustrated and look for the same information elsewhere.
Responsive Web Design ensures websites present visitors with the most user-friendly experience every time. Responsive design is vital to give parents the most accessible gateway to your school, offering an effective way to discover everything they need to know without a single moment of irritation.
The more you embrace this approach, the less reason you give parents to leave the site.

Key Features of a Responsive School Website

Responsive school websites tend to share certain elements. These combine to create a browsing experience that suits parents and prospective students alike, catering to the mother who’s researching your school at her office computer just as well as the child doing the same on her tablet.
So, what are these features and why do they matter?

Lots of whitespace

Whitespace is not just the empty parts of a website — it’s actually a major aspect of great design. Whitespace helps to make your text and images appear less cluttered, allows visitors to understand what they’re reading better and makes scanning for relevant information much easier.
Responsive school website design ensures your whitespace will remain proportionate and content will appear formatted just as well on tiny screens as bigger ones. This makes browsing far more comfortable.

Optimized visual content

Images must be optimized to display properly on all devices and load as quickly as possible. Loading times can make or break your browsing experience: if parents or children are searching for information but can’t access text because your images are slowing the site right down, they’re unlikely to keep waiting. If they do, they’ll become frustrated and be reluctant to return in future.
Image sizes must be reduced to facilitate fast load times.

An intuitive approach to navigation

Good navigation matters. Users will never appreciate having to constantly click back and forth through slow-loading pages because they tapped the wrong button or were misdirected.
Your visitors want to find exactly that they’re looking for with the bare minimum of hassle. Your school website should be built to allow for smooth, simple, intuitive navigation on all devices. Clear menus are a must, with obvious category titles and page layouts.
These key elements should guide you in building or overhauling your school website. Always keep the parents or children visiting your site, and their journey, in mind. Put yourself in their shoes and consider what would help you get the most out of the experience.

Helpful Pages your Responsive School Website Must Have

Your website should look and feel unique to your school. It should reflect your school’s values and goals as much as possible.
The tone of voice, images and colour scheme all need to capture the character of your school. Providing all the information parents and students require throughout the year is crucial, and there are certain staple pages you should incorporate to do so.

Calendar

Always keep your school calendar updated with relevant events, such as holidays and special occasions. Give parents at-a-glance information they can find within seconds.
Letting your calendar go out of date may indicate to visitors that your school is unprofessional and disorganized.

Teacher profiles

Parents want to know who’s teaching their children. Include a brief bio and pictures of your teaching staff to help build a closer bond and cultivate a sense of community.

Contacts

Who should parents call if their child is too sick to attend school one day? Who is in charge of organizing field trips or a school event? How can parents reach the head teacher?
Make sure you always carry up-to-date contact details on your school website, to give parents exactly what they need to reach your team. This is vital in emergencies.

School Jotter is an innovative platform allowing schools just like yours to build custom websites. More than 3,000 schools across the UK work with School Jotter, creating and maintaining their own domains with simple, user-friendly tools. Upload images and videos, reach out to parents with emails, host quizzes and more to engage with your community.
Please don’t hesitate to contact Webanywhere if you wish to learn more about how School Jotter can help you create the perfect website for your school.

Website design is a constantly evolving entity, meaning that any industry engaging with the Internet needs to constantly evolve as well. Keeping abreast with the top web design trends for websites is vital for any school that wishes to engage with parents and pupils alike. And there are a variety of disruptive technologies available that make it possible for any school website to be truly inspiring.

Drone Technology

One of the innovations that is particularly impacting on school website design is that of drone technology. This enables some spectacular videos to be produced, and at a pretty affordable price point. With commercial drones now able to carry HD, and even 4K, cameras, the ability to fly over inaccessible areas and capture spectacular photographs and videos has become entirely viable.

There are now millions of drone aircraft in circulation, and footage captured from them is becoming extremely popular. By embracing the drone revolution, schools are able to tap into the technology zeitgeist, making their websites far more attractive to young people in particular. Drone footage really can be an excellent way of grabbing attention, and firing visitors’ imaginations.

Customisation

Customising websites in order to deliver individual experiences can also be an effective way of standing out from the crowd. It is always worth bearing in mind that there is a potentially wide range of users of all educational websites, with teachers, students, parents and administrators all interested parties.
As each of these groups will require completely different information from your website, the argument for customisation becomes more compelling. Personalising content to satisfy the needs of a particular group is an effective way of making people feel valued when they access your webpage. Extracting user profile data, and personalising content within sections, are both valid ways of achieving this goal.

Video Engagement

Speaking of engagement, using videos is also to be recommended. So much can be done with online video sharing nowadays, and it is even possible for schools to generate a significant presence on sites such as YouTube. Videos can help to deliver such content as the headmaster or headmistress introducing the school, various key teachers providing information on their departments, alumni giving testimonials, and current students providing their views on learning as well.
Providing video material can be a highly effective way of reaching people, and establishing a video platform can also help to make use of the drone footage suggested previously.

Virtual Reality

And you capture attention and imagination further still by embracing the disruptive trend of virtual reality. VR is establishing itself via video games platforms such as Oculus Rift and the PlayStation VR project, and will soon be widely available for other businesses as well. Virtual reality will be able to provide a unique insight into facilities across any educational establishment, placing people at home right in the midst of the school.

This form of technology will particularly resonate with young people, especially as it becomes more widely available. Although virtual reality has yet to truly land in the mainstream, this is expected to occur over the next few years. And it would be advisable for schools to embrace this innovation now, in order to get ahead of the curve.

Photographs and Images

Quality photography should also be an absolute priority for all school websites. This is arguably the most important part of any site, as delivering striking images will really have an impact on the initial impression of parents and potential pupils. While video material and text both has its place, it is really imagery that will create that all important first impression, and this is why it should be produced diligently.
Thus, most schools will benefit from having a professional photographer create the imagery to appear on their website. While it is certainly possible to create high quality photography with commercially available cameras, a professional photographer will have a better quality of equipment, and, of course, much more experience with producing photographs.
Photography can be used to showcase the exterior of a school, along with the interior settings as well. Pictures really have an impact on how people feel or think about a particular subject, and photography really represents an opportunity to influence your potential audience. You can also create a pleasing video impression by using techniques such as slideshows and carousels, in order to really grab the attention of visitors.

Content Management

It is also important to use a suitable content management framework when designing and maintaining your website. Drupal has become a popular choice, being used by Harvard University, University of Yale, Stanford Law School, and Oxford University. However, this system isn’t ubiquitous, and there are plenty of others available that may better suit your particular institution.
But content management systems certainly shouldn’t be ignored, as they enable responsive school website designs and multi-site functionality to be implemented more easily. They also enable schools to control and manage the publication of workflow more easily, while exceptional content and user access control is also a requisite feature. Such systems can also make it easier to launch email and social media campaigns.

Progressive Mobile Applications

Finally, it is advisable for schools to embrace the mobile revolution. Combining your website with progressive mobile applications can really help garner attention, and particularly capture the imagination of young people. All schools should be looking at a multi-faceted approach when engaging with their potential audience, as this will allow them to cover the most bases possible.
The possibilities with school website design are always growing broader and more impressive, and it is important for schools to keep up with the latest trends, in order to ensure that they are not left behind. Standing still is simply not an option in this highly technological age, so keeping your finger on the pulse is absolutely essential if you wish to ensure that your school website creates a favourable impression with your audience.