Suggestions for Troop Website?

[fritz1255]

My son as troop Scribe has started a new Troop Website. Other than numerous spelling mistakes, he is doing OK, although it is not as slick as many I have seen. That is fine by us, since we want it to be run by the boys, not adults. Some years ago when I did the website for his Cub Pack, one of the dads who is an IT professional suggested that I should do the Pack calendar using a database program that he had - would "only take a few hours to learn". I politely declined. The website is all of three pages so far:

1) Troop Calendar for the entire year
2) Contacts and Links - contacts at the Council office, links to useful websites
3) Announcements - latest Troop news

We plan to add pages of pictures from events. Any other suggestions as to what else we could add? The link to it is as follows: http://www.geocities.com/tr18bsa/main_page

[Mrw]

Just don't identify the boys in the pictures by name or give any information that could be used to directly identify or contact the kids.

You have the basics right there.

Our troop also has a basic camping packing list posted so new parents can check and feel less nervous about whether little (insert new scout name) is reasonably prepared to go into the great wide world without them.

[FrankJ]

Keeping the website up to date is more important then fancy graphics. Remember that not everybody has a hi speed connection to the Internet, make sure it loads quickly with a dial up connection.

Congrats. to your son.

[jr56]

Sounds to me like he is on the right track.

[scouter01]

Maybe go to a large grafic designing company and ask if they will look at and make a few suggestions wuikly one day (pro bono of course

[longhorneagle]

Take a look at other troop's web sites for ideals. www.troop254.org

[scouter01]

make sure he spell cheacks evryhting he types. he can just copy the text into microsft word.

[Eagle77]

Just a suggestion for your calendar. We use Google calendar. It is very user friendly. You update it on Google and embed it on your site. Google has very detailed instructions on how to do this. We give all of our adult leaders the passwords so they can update the calendar. Also, when we have a Scout that is working on his Eagle Service Project, we give him the passwords so he can put all of his work days on the calendar. You can also send out invitations to the work days or other events through Google Calendar. You can see ours at www.BSATroop305.com.

[Eagle77]

Another suggestion for your website. Don't use last names on the web site for your Scouts. BSA recommends only using first names and first initial of last name. Also, no phone numbers or other contact information. I noticed that you have all of your youth leaders identified by first and last name. For their protection, you should change that.

[ScoutingStokes]

Congratulations to your son! Looks like he's done a lot more work on it since your initial posting! Our Troop wanted a website, but noone knew how to do it or wanted to take it on. Our boys are all very young and didn't know how to go about it either, so I ended up volunteering for it. Boy, did I learn a LOT! It's taken me since Sept '07 to create what we have www.bsatroop239.net (Check it out soon, because it's about to be dismantled. We have an IT dad that just joined us - he has demanded - with the Committee's support - that I hand the site over to him - it's not up to his standards.) Tell your son to keep working on it - the fancy graphics and slick appearance are not what's important. His hard work for his Troop and his dedication to getting the information out there is what's important!!! If he'd like any advice from a non-professional about easy to use programs (that won't take hours to learn! ) give me a shout!

[Ursus Snorous Roarus]

I've been fighting this for the past 10 years: Be careful who you let take on the website! I've had Dads, brothers, even past Scouts promise to 'fix' the website dozens of times! After a couple months they've lost interest and moved onto the next shiny object and I'm stuck with an outdated site and a million questions from parents about why it's not current. I never wanted to learn HTML but had to out of frustration.... Now that I have it's been great, but is tough to keep up with at times. So KEEP IT SIMPLE that any non-IT person can edit and update. If it's too difficult to do it will die!

[ScoutingStokes]

That was my thought when I started it - keep it simple so that I can train a boy to take it over. Or at least help with it. One of my sons helped me test run different programs until we found one that was user friendly to both of us.

Unfortunately, I don't have a choice of whether or not to give up the website. The SM, CC and I don't see eye to eye over some sillythings like whether they have complete power or should take training...I have another thread going about all the ridiculous goings on so I won't repeat it here. Suffice it to say that this IT dad is using the situation to convince the CC to TAKE the website from me and give it to him.

Did you look at it? What do you think of what I did? I'd love to see yours! I've been checking out other Troops sites all day!

[RWSmith]

Split Facebook posts to new thread.