How to build a website for high school team?

[SRath]

Does anyone know where I can find instructions, template, whatever to put together a website for the high school trap shooting team I am coaching? The amount of time I spend on the phone and sending emails and downloading and printing forms and information is getting to be too much as our team is exploding in size this season.



I need to put up a website that tells about the team, has links to all the various registration forms, sanctioning bodies' websites, etc. I also need to be able to post information for the members on a member-login page.



Here is the website from another nearby high school trap team Cedar Falls Athletics and Activities - Trapshooting



It has some very good features and information. I also want to put photos of the team and the individual members up and tell something about each one. The only way I can manage a team as large as our's is getting to be is to keep access to information available to everyone on their own and to make them responsible for getting it. (Have you ever tried printing forms and distributing them to team members in school? Or emailing and calling 20-30 teenagers and their parents in one evening? They all have numerous email addresses that they do not check (they're on facebook or something instead) and everyone has two or three phone numbers that they don't answer, either. )



I'm computer challenged and our website needs to be fairly idiot-proof and easy for me to change or add to.



One of my assistant coaches thought he could do this, but after waiting and/or trying for a month and a half he finally decided he could not. Is it really difficult and is there any way to do it myself?



The website should prove very useful for gaining support and sponsors and fundraising, too. But until we get some fundraising going I cannot pay some techie to do a proper job. catch 22.



I appreciate any help in pointing me in the right direction!

 

[SRath]

Naturally, I started with a web search for information on my endeavor. This is definitely a case of way too much information! I cannot believe how many 'free web hosting' services are out there, but they all have "upgrade fees" and they all claim to be the best and easiest etc etc.

A guy could get seriously lost in there and end up with regrets.

 

[BoeingDiesel]

Scott, how about a Weblog (Blog). You can update as often as you like, post comments, pictures, etc. Check out WordPress.

 

[fest3er]

As BD says, WordPress may be your best best. It still requires some technical know-how to install and configure, more know-how to make it look good (or to install a 'theme' from somewhere). But it is one of the easier ways to set up and maintain static web pages.



Alas, spam will become your worst enemy if you don't take steps at the very start to prevent it. If you use WordPress (or Drupal or any of several other blogging systems), you'll want two things:

1. BadBehavior - a software package that compares visitors' IP addresses against those of known spammers; when there's a match, the visitor is denied access to the site. Period.
   
2. A human question 'captcha' system - most 'captcha' systems rely on creating an image containing warped characters/letters that they insist only a human can read. Guess what? Spammers have algorithms that read those images PDQ. Image captchas are worthless. The only method that works is to ask questions that require a human to interpret and provide a response.
   
   
   
   For example, Steve could program the TDR site to ask such questions as:
   
   • Who is the editor of the TDR magazine?
     
   • Who is the administrator the TDR web site?
     
   • Which two brands are the primary focus of TDR?
     
   • What is the favored fuel of TDR members?
     
   • Who built 'The Red Rocket'?
     

With those two add-ons, your site should remain relatively spam-free. You'll spend far more time maintaining the info on the site instead of managing spam. I installed a question captcha module on MDTDC's vB forum a couple years ago; the number of spammers applying for membership dropped precipitously.

 

[SRath]

I have several pressing needs that I believe a website will address. maybe a blog would, too, but I have my doubts that a blog can offer as many features or flexibility as a website. Maybe it can? Some things, a blog could clearly do.

One is communication: I am spending far to many hours sending countless emails and trying too many phone numbers to reach team members. The team is more than twice as big as last year and it's just too much. Some kids and parents have easily half a dozen email addresses and phone numbers between them; none of which they seem to monitor regularly. And I won't even get into the "Facebook" excuse. I don't do facebook; period.

With a website, I would post practice and competition schedules and info and updates in one place and each team member would be responsible to check there for all information. I want a page where each member is introduced and profiled and can link to or from his or her Facebook page if they wish. A "Meet the team" page, if you will.

I also want a member-only login page for team communications.

Other features could include a "wishlist" page of items the team could put to good use if any supporters out there might have them to donate. It never hurts to ask and things like reloaders and supplies and even guns are often just sitting and collecting dust somewhere. Maybe a team bus? Maybe a place near home to practice instead of having to drive 70 miles round-trip. You never know until you ask.

Fundraising is another way a website could be a powerful tool.

My son's good friend since grade school, who is also a member of another high school's trap team that my son helped to found with him, is also a computer whiz kid who has been making really good money building websites for the University and many businesses since his Jr. High days. They are also in a rock band together and the other night when they played a charity fundraiser for a couple of families in a nearby town, I had a chance to approach him about doing a website for our team. As soon as prom is over (this coming weekend) he says he will be happy to, so maybe I have this problem solved.

Talking with other coaches, they confirm that websites have solved many of these very problems for them. here is just one website for a team in a nearby town. It looks nicer without the DNR pasted-up thing covering the front page, but you get the idea: https://sites.google.com/a/vinton-shellsburg.k12.ia.us/red-cedar-shooters-vinton-s/home

Sorry to be so slow getting back to this thread, Boeing and Neal, it went unresponded to for so long I just gave up on it after awhile and didn't check back.

Thanks for the input!

 

[fest3er]

Seems you're halfway there. You've a good idea of what the web site's high-level requirements are:

• Home page showing the team's current and next activities and simple, clear navigation to the other pages
• Competition page showing the schedule and the team's successes and ... lessons
• Member page highlighting the team members
• Shameless begging page showing the team's equipment/capital needs, current fundraising campaign and progress
• Member- (or member-/parent-) only page for private team communications, forms
• Archive page showing previous schedules, successes, lessons and sponsors
• A box on every page that quietly highlights a different donor/benefactor/business/sponsor every time the page is visited.
• A means of letting team leaders/advisors update the site's contents without having to bother the programmer every time.

That takes cares of the information 'push'. You'll also want to let people/fans share their enthusiasm by posting comments on the site. You might even want a way to tag the best of them for display on the home page.

Your next task is to roughly sketch what you'd want the site to look like: give the site implementer a clue which direction to go.

WordPress may still be the best way to go, so long as your programmer could include strong spam-control features. A WordPress example: Sippie's Sauce. John found a local guy to create the site (the aesthetics are very good), but ecommerce was beyond his abilities. So John found me, and I hacked up the 'Buy Online' page.

 

[BoeingDiesel]

Fester is obviously very savvy in this area. I’m also in the process of creating a site and Wordpress seems to have all the necessary gadgets needed to communicate my point. From what I’ve been told, it’s relatively easy to manage and very flexible, but keep in mind, I have no technical experience in this area so I’m relying on my daughter to do the building. The biggest problem I’m having is the opening page re; graphics layout and text. My site will be, ‘kind of political in nature’ targeting the FAA and airline pilot community lobbying for higher safety standards, so the opening page has to catch the attention of the viewer.

By the way…right-on SRath for taking time out of your life and giving back to your community… shooting trap and skeet is one of my passions…thumbs up!