Updated February 4, 1999


Take Charge of Change! Social Work '97!Sunday, October 4, 1997, 3:45 pm to 5:15 pm, The Internet Room

Becoming an Agency Webmaster

Baltimore, MD

SUNDAY, OCTOBER  5

3:45pm - 5:15 pm


Become an Agency Webmaster
Internet Room
Overcome the pragmatic challenges of being a Webmaster in this hands-on
class.  We will discuss advanced functions on Web sites, such as chats,
banners, site maps, and commercial transactions.  Tips will be given on
Webmaster resources, marketing your site, selecting links, and agency
planning for hardware upgrades.  First-come, first-served!
 --Thomas Hanna; Dick Schoech, PhD; Rita Vandivort, ACSW
4:15 - 4:30.
Content: Forums, Publishing, Search Features, Access, and Liability Issues.
4:40 - 4:50
Marketing: who should know you are here, and what will they get when they get here?
Transactions: Do we want cash?

  • Objectives and Policies
    • Translate non-web information into web material
    • Organize the knowledge of your organization
    • Make it a part of all jobs
    • Meet the organizational mission
    • Getting Input
    • Finding out if it works

  • Where to learn the net
  • Where to learn the basics of HTML online
  • Where to get the tools for CGI Scripts:
  • Forums, calendars, chats, and access tools and statistics
  • Transactions

  • Requirements
    • Simple to use technology; convincing outcomes
    • Risk Management: Keeping Liability At Bay
    • Other issues (such as "where do I get the time?")

    • We need to gather new ideas in face-to-face and virtual meetings with professionals in the field. And we need to find other ways that the field is already overcoming barriers and problems.

  • Meeting the Needs
    • A highly effective and interactive environment
    • A rewarding experience for the user and for the outside visitor
    • A significant amount of useful information

    • Our experience is that these needs are rarely met, except in a structured internet information service system. How is SACWIS working in your state? And what does your agency want to offer onthe internet to help staff and help visitors?

  • Cost Analysis
    • The Internet, properly budgeted, is a net savings
    • No other technology delivers as much at such a small cost in time

    • Communication costs time, and it is never efficient at the 100% level. Actually, 50% is a high hit rate.

  • The Single Entry Point Approach

    • There is little sense in having every agency trying to be its own repository of knowledge and information. There is less sense in having every agency trying to establish an Internet site to "grab a niche." The best of the Internet is always a open environment for linking people together, and linking problems to solutions

  • Key Benefits: The Internet solves two key problems:
    • Local problems tend to persist
    • Local solutions tend to remain local

    • Our work has shown that the Internet makes local problems a matter of global concern, and over and over again, we have found that this global effort breaks through the problem, and like chopping wood, it "heats twice."

    While it is more difficult, even on the Internet, to "spread the good word" there is no doubt that hearing good ideas from distant places always has its allure, and good ideas travel fast.

  • Next Steps
    • Use the resources that are already developed
    • Make sure the Webmasters hear what's right and wrong
    • Be the first to suggest new ideas to the Webmasters
    • Give us your most knotty problems if you must, but get online! 

    • Whereas, for several years, it has been the policy of our agency to support all
expedient efforts to use the Internet to help meet the mission of service to our 
clients and constituents, and

Whereas agency action has already resulted in such major steps as putting the
needed technology in place, and creating a new position in City government
dedicated to the purposes of network services, and

Whereas every department of the agency, and several members of the Board have 
participated in building our networking capacity to its present state, and

Whereas the agency has been well represented in several interagency and
inter-entity efforts to assure that the benefits of the Information Revolution
reach all users of the human services in our jurisdiction, and

Whereas it is now recognized that the Internet and the World Wide Web are very
effective methods of delivering information to people, and

Whereas human service entities throughout the United States have already established very
extensive and interactive Web sites to provide information in support of their
mission, including promotion of community development, family well being, enforcement procedures, 
child and adult protection, and promotion of effective program evaluation, and

Whereas it is the policy of the agency to support, rather than inhibit,
the flow of information to our clients and our constituencies, now therefore, be it

RESOLVED that it is the policy of the agency that all departments:

1.  Shall develop a proposal, with a timeline, to move all publically accessible
information to the World Wide Web,
2.  Shall designate a "web contact" from among current staff, to assure the rapid
movement of public information to the World Wide Web,

and be it further

RESOLVED that under this policy, Department heads or their designees  

3.  Shall review posted materials to the Web for appropriateness, accuracy, and
effectiveness in supporting the mission of the Department and the Agency, and
4.  Shall assure that Web publishing is consistent with existing policies that
protect private and confidential information from being made public.

    Technical Sessions COORDINATOR: Rita E. Vandivort-Warren, ACSW National Association of Social Workers
    750 First Street N.E., Suite 700
    Washington, D.C. 20002-4241
    202/336-8218 or
    800/638-8799, ext 218




    for information on any of these sessions, write to NASW

    for information on the organization, visit the NASW Home Page
    for information on the presenter, and visit the



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