CampusGRID - FAQs about our Web Site Service

Frequently Asked Questions about
CampusGRID's Web Site Service

About the CampusGRID Web Site service

About the CampusGRID web site service

1. What are some of the web site features you offer to schools?
CampusGRID provides schools with the following web site hosting benefits:

Low Cost - The CampusGRID services start at less than $17 per month.
No Ads - No banner ads on the school web site.
Fast - create web pages in minutes with our online template forms.
Flexible - accepts existing HTML pages. So, there is no limit on creativity or layout. Works with JavaScript, Java, etc.
Online - accessible from anywhere. Work on your web site from home or school.
Self-Publishing - teachers and students can create and integrate pages themselves; so no waiting!
Flexible Security - contributor's access is restricted only to pre-assigned areas.
Approve Before Publish - Students may contribute to the site, but may not publish until it is reviewed and approved.
Simple - eliminates complexity. No more FTP, file upload, or special software.

2. How does a CampusGRID web site improve communication to parents?
We are in the age of the internet. When people need information, they go to the internet. So it stands to reason that parents want a simple, convenient, reliable, timely and consistent web site at which to find school information. CampusGRID gives schools an easy, quick way to provide that information and more importantly, keep it current and up-to-date.
No matter how hard they may try, no one single webmaster can do an effective job of putting all the current information on the web site that parents may need. It takes wide-spread collaboration by many members of the school to accomplish this. Only CampusGRID provides a truly secure collaborative web site service specifically tailored for the needs of schools.

Successfully achieving collaboration by many staff members means that the service must be easy to use. One of the features that CampusGRID offers is a number of convenient templates that lets any teacher quickly enter information online in a handy and simple form. The template then instantly creates a web page and places it on the web site.
Included templates allow teachers to enter homework assignment information, calendars, newsletters, photos and web links. Anyone can do it!
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3. How is CampusGRID better than other site-building tools?
There are several different ways to create web sites today, but schools need collaborative web sites where many people contribute simultaneously. And no one provides the simplicity of CampusGRID for creating collaborative web sites.

Some of the benefits of CampusGRID for school web sites include:

Less work for the webmaster
School webmasters are usually volunteers working on the site part-time and are often unpaid. The large amount of work needed to create and maintain a collaborative web site, such as a school site, makes the job time consuming and tedious.
Teacher Webpages
Many teachers would love to have their own web page, especially if it was well integrated into the school web site. But, most find conventional web page creation tools too daunting to use. Even those who receive web page creation training quickly forget how to use it and give up.
Easy-to-use online templates
Now, with CampusGRID’s online templates, teachers and students can create pages in minutes, with no special know-how, software or tools. The pages are quickly integrated because links are created automatically. And, best of all, teachers can self-publish their pages without requiring the help or assistance of the webmistress!
Widespread Collaboration
Conventional web site techniques are an all or nothing proposition. Either everyone can access the site or only a limited few. But, because schools cannot afford to give students free access to the web site, nor allow them to publish pages without review by a staff member; the only choice for schools is to limit access to a few. This means that the burden gets dumped back on a few teachers to do the entire posting, testing and fixing of web pages.
Easy and flexible content Publishing
With CampusGRID, everyone works on a draft version of his or her page, which does not appear on the site until an authority publishes it. They can do their own design, testing, and editing without needing or involving the webmaster. Since students are not allowed to self-publish, an assigned Publisher will receive notification when a Student’s work is ready for publishing. They can review it online and publish it immediately without a time consuming hassle. It’s fool proof, but simple.

4. How is CampusGRID different than other web site hosting services?
CampusGRID is targeted at meeting the unique requirements of schools. School web sites are usually maintained by volunteers, who have very limited time and often limited technical expertise at creating web sites. We recognize this, so our focus is on providing useful tools which reduce the amount of work and knowledge required to create and maintain the web site. Furthermore, we enable a wide range of people, typically the school staff or students, to easily contribute and integrate their content into the web site in a fast, simple, and secure way.
CampusGRID eliminates many of the common hassles of web site maintenance, while offering a wide degree of flexibility to accommodate new or experienced creators of web pages.
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5. How does my school get a CampusGRID web site?
Schools webmasters or staff can get their CampusGRID web site by simply going to our Registration page. There is no initial charge for the service, and you will receive your site almost immediately. At first your site will have a Visitor Lock, which will require visitors to enter a password to enter the site. This is to keep the site private while you are working on it.
Shortly after assigning a site to you, CampusGRID may contact your school to verify that you are a member of the school staff and that the school information is correct. Meanwhile, you will be able to work on the site to prepare it for "launch".
Before your site can become an official web site for your school, an authorized representative of the school should review the Terms of Use agreement.

Eventually, you must pay a small annual fee for the use of the CampusGRID service. These fees are listed on our School Fee page.
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6. How much does it cost?
The CampusGRID service is very inexpensive, usually costing less than $1 per student per year— for smaller schools, as low as $17 per month! This is less than what a conventional web site ISP charges! And CampusGRID provides many additional specialized and convenient functions tailored just for schools! Furthermore, CampusGRID has no annoying banner ads or other advertising on the school site. Our fees are listed on our School Fee page.
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7. Is my site viewable to the public?
Yes, the CampusGRID service hosts a standard public web site for your school. To keep your site private during the initial development phase, you may decide to place a Visitor Lock that requires a password for entry. When you are ready to make your school site accessible to others, you may remove the Visitor Lock and the site is officially "public".
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8. Does my web site get its own Internet address (URL)?
Yes. Each school may select their own web address name. Your school site URL will typically be in the format of http://myschool.st.campusgrid.net, where "st" is the two- letter abbreviation for your state. When you register online, you are given the opportunity to pick the "my school" name. If the school name that you choose is taken, you may pick any available alternate name.
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9. If I use CampusGRID, what do I do with my existing web site pages?
One of the major benefits of the CampusGRID service is its flexibility. Unlike most other web site hosting services, we can accept and integrate your existing HTML files without change. This means that you can move them to our service and be up and running in no time. You can even leave them on your existing server and simply point to them with our unique container page templates. This greatly simplifies the startup process. All you need do is define the navigation outline for your site and place your HTML files into these topics. Some of the school sites using our service contain almost entirely HTML files, while others are entirely created with our online templates. CampusGRID is very flexible!
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10. If CampusGRID is so easy, do I need a school webmaster?
It is recommended that you have a webmaster, but with CampusGRID the role and workload of the webmaster is greatly reduced compared to typical web sites. With our service, the main role of the webmistress, or administrator of the site, is to initially organize and assign user access to the site. These users may then further delegate access to others without involving the webmaster. Most users will be given publishing rights, so there will be no need to involve the webmaster in posting content to the site, correcting links or errors in pages, and updating their content. With CampusGRID, the webmistress mainly deals with configuration, not content integration. So, her or his task is usually just to create the top-level folders (navigation links) for the menu, to create a home page and to add the site banner in the top frame.
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11. CampusGRID seems like a great way to get the teachers at our school involved, but most of them know nothing about creating web pages. Is there some easy way to get them started?
Yes, we have a number of ways to help your teachers and staff get started. These include Quick Start Guides to give an overview of the service and help for creating Classroom web pages. Our Getting Started page on the CampusGRID Support site provides additional information and help. We also include online context-sensitive help, a printable User manual, as well as step-by-step instructions built right into the service. But, most importantly, we’ve designed the service to be easy to use and simple to learn.

For example, the easy-to-use templates make creating, publishing and updating web pages a breeze.

Because all site access is done online, a teacher or student can work from school, home or anywhere they have web access.
Entering information into the templates is as easy as typing into a word processor.
Posting the pages to the web site is also done from within the browser. No more complicated FTP software or login.
The templates automatically format your text according to the fields that you type them into.
There is no need to know any HTML or web page jargon. If you can browse the files on your computer, you can upload and link graphic images into your template.
The templates have simple step-by-step instructions that walk you through page creation.

There are many schools using our service in which every teacher has created at least one page on the site using a template!
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12. I want to check my student's work before it goes on my site. How can I do that?
The default mode for the CampusGRID service is to require the review of any student’s work by an adult before it is published.

For trusted users, such as teachers, your webmaster will assign an access level to which allows them to self-publish their own content. This way the webmaster has less work and more people can contribute to the site..

When a Student submits their page for publication, the CampusGRID service can be configured to automatically notify, via email, the teacher who is to review their work. When they receive notification, they will review the page and will publish, reject or edit it. If the page is published, the Student will automatically be notified as well. This process speeds the publishing of pages and ensures that the web site is timely and relevant. Waiting for someone else to publish your pages is a thing of the past. Because the content is always online, the Publisher needs only go to the browser and click a button to publish.
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13. Should I trust students with my password so they can access the site?
Students can be given their own individual access to their own areas of the web site. This eliminates the need for them to share your password.
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14. Can we have private, password-protected areas of our web site?
Any Topic (navigation area) of the site may have a Visitor Lock. Whenever such Topic is visited, a password will be required for access. So, for instance, students may be given their own web site area, which is accessible by family members only. School staff, clubs and other activities may also have their own private areas within the main school site. This means they too may take advantage of CampusGRID's easy and convenient service to setup and maintain these private areas.
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15. I want to have more control over the look of my pages than templates give me. How can I do that?
CampusGRID’s flexibility allows several ways to customize your pages.

First of all, you can create any type of HTML page using the many available software programs for web publishing, i.e. create an HTML file. With any such program, just save your file as HTML and then upload it right from your browser into your CampusGRID web site. Our flexible system accepts any HTML and even lets you use JavaScript, Java or other programming. You can even make your HTML page the default page for a Topic, so when a visitor navigates to the Topic, your page automatically appears. There is no linking required!
Another choice that you have is to select from one of the CampusGRID site designs. These give you a choice of font and background colors for your site. Of course, you always have full control over the site banner which appears at the top of each page of the web site.

16. Does CampusGRID limit the amount of storage space provided for a web site?
Each site may use up to 50MB of storage, which is generally more than enough for even the most ambitious web site. But, in case you want more storage, with CampusGRID, you can easily point to pages and files which are located on other servers, such as on your district server. These supplemental pages will appear as if they were in your main web site. So, if you have storage space available on other servers, you can use it as additional storage for your web site. CampusGRID may provide additional storage, beyond 50MB, to schools on a case-by-case basis. Please contact our support group if you wish to make such a request.
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17. When assigning access, does CampusGRID distinguish between students and teachers?
We don’t specifically distinguish between students and teachers. Rather we allow the schools the flexibility to assign publishing rights based upon the need and capability of each user. But typically students are not given publishing rights to the site. This means that they can create and submit web pages and other content, but then it must be reviewed and published by someone else (typically a teacher or webmaster) who has been given these rights. The Submit/Approval is very simple with CampusGRID and can be automatically accomplished by email right from within the service.
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18. Can any elementary, middle or high school use CampusGRID?
Yes, there are many active CampusGRID sites for both private and public elementary, middle and high schools.
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19. Can colleges or international schools use the CampusGRID service?
At this time, we do not provide web sites services for colleges or universities.
Rather we target our services to public and private K-12 and pre-schools.
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20. Does using CampusGRID conflict with my school's web site policies?
CampusGRID’s service conforms to the requirements of most public and private schools in the U.S. Our flexible security system may be configured to meet even the most stringent school or district policies. For example, your school may require that all content contributed by a student must be reviewed before it is published. This is the default mode of CampusGRID’s service. CampusGRID also offers a simple setup option if your school requires that all content from any teacher or student be reviewed by a single school or district authority.
Some districts may have policies requiring that school web site content be posted behind a firewalled server located at the district or school site. However, CampusGRID provides equivalent or better security than most school systems even when behind a firewall. Furthermore, maintaining and updating a web site which is behind a firewall is very inconvenient and counterproductive to having an effective, regularly updated web site. Many districts have reviewed and liberalized their policy on remote web site hosting after working with CampusGRID. If you consider that for years it has been common practice for many US government institutions, such as the IRS and Social Security agencies, to use outside, third party computer services to maintain and process highly sensitive data, you will realize that CampusGRID’s hosting of your school web site service is not a high risk to your school or district.
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21. Will my school or district let us host our web site with an external host such as CampusGRID?
Generally most Districts' policy is to give individual schools the autonomy to create and maintain their web site. The Districts’ biggest concerns are: 1) to ensure security and 2) to prevent inappropriate content from appearing on the school site.
With CampusGRID, neither of these concerns are compromised. We work closely with school districts to comply with these policies. In every case, CampusGRID hosts a first class, professionally maintained web site for each school in the district. We safeguard web site’s content, access to the site and the method of administration of the site.
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22. How can we be sure that the CampusGRID service will be reliable?
We host our site at a professionally maintained facility, which has a number of important security and backup features. These include:

24x7 secure, restricted-access to the server facility
Private, locked cages for all servers
Regular backups of all server contents including each school’s complete web site contents
UPS (Uninterruptible Power Supply) ensures no shutdowns due to sudden power outages.
High speed connection to the internet backbone
Constant service monitoring (checks approx. every 10-15 minutes) ensures a quick reaction by CampusGRID if the service were to be unavailable for any reason.

23. Will you place advertising on our school web site?
CampusGRID has a firm policy that we will not place any third party advertising on your school web site without the prior consent of the school.
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24. Who controls the content that is posted on the CampusGRID web site?
You retain full rights to any school content that is posted at the CampusGRID service. You may remove this content at any time including after termination of the service. When you post any content to our service, you grant us license to reproduce, modify and publish the Content for the purpose of displaying, distributing and promoting our services.
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Frequently Asked Questions about CampusGRID's Web Site Service

About the CampusGRID Web Site service

About the CampusGRID web site service

Frequently Asked Questions about
CampusGRID's Web Site Service