[LINK] Government web sites

[Stephen Loosley]

Hello there,

In view of today's discussion regarding two Australian Government
web sites, web-savvy Linkers may be interested in the following U.S.
Federal Education Department announcement. Is this state of the art?

--
From: "Winters, Kirk" <Kirk.Winters@ed.gov>
Subject: ED Launches Redesigned Web Site
Date: Tue, 16 Oct 2001 14:16:06 -0400
Sender: owner-edinfo@inet.ed.gov

THE DEPARTMENT LAUNCHED a new web site today.

It is described in the press release below.

A dedicated team in our Office of the Chief Information Officer,
led by Keith Stubbs, worked for more than a year to develop the
new site. We are still making refinements. Your  comments and
feedback are invited.

Kirk Winters
EDInfo, U.S. Department of Education
kirk.winters@ed.gov

===============================================
ED Launches Redesigned Web Site: The <http://www.ed.gov>
redesign makes the site easier to use & offers users novel options
to customize the site for their needs & interests. October 16, 2001
================================================

U.S. Secretary of Education Rod Paige announced today that the
Department of Education Web site has been redesigned to improve
its organization & function for all customers & to offer users interested
in customizing the Web site the option to personalize it.

"This redesigned site can help reduce the time teachers, parents &
others spend looking for information so they can spend more time
using it to help children learn," Paige said. "The new www.ed.gov
is part of what will be an ongoing effort to make the information &
resources of the Department of Education available & understandable
to policymakers, government leaders educators, parents & students
alike."

The new www.ed.gov site includes several improvements & adds
new features for its users including the following:

* Information has been reorganized & can be reached through
multiple paths, including these five categories: grants & contracts,
financial aid for students, education resources, research & statistics
& policy.

* Customized pages have been created for teachers, principals,
parents & families, students, higher education institutions & grantees
& technical assistance providers.

* Visitors may personalize the site to see the latest
information about their favorite topics. They can also sign
up for weekly updates announcing new additions to the site.

* An improved search function will produce results that are more
relevant & reliable.

The redesign keeps the best features of the previous site.

Visitors using the search function may still search www.ed.gov as
well as the hundreds of Web sites supported by department grants
& programs. The redesigned site also offers an alphabetical index
of the best starting points for research on the site & includes a site
map to provide a bird's-eye view of the entire site. (snip)

The ED Web site -- www.ed.gov -- is consistently ranked among the
top 10 most-visited government Web sites, with an average of more
than 1 million visitors & more than 12 million page views each month.

A study of government Web sites, released in September 2001 by
Brown University, ranked it sixth in quality among 58 federal sites.

The redesign of www.ed.gov was launched in response to feedback
from users who completed a survey on the Web site. The redesigned
site launched today represents the first phase of redesign
activity, & the department will continue to improve the structure,
presentation & function of the resources & materials available on
the redesigned Web site during a second phase of redesign activity
that will begin shortly & continue through 2002.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Past EDInfo messages: http://www.ed.gov/MailingLists/EDInfo/
Search: http://www.ed.gov/MailingLists/EDInfo/search.html
Past ED Initiatives: http://www.ed.gov/pubs/EDInitiatives/
===========================================================

Kirk Winters
U.S. Department of Education
kirk.winters@ed.gov
--

Cheers all ..
Stephen Loosley
<http://stephen.ws>