Dear Worcester Public Schools Families and Staff,
We are excited to announce that the new Worcester Public Schools (WPS) website will launch this weekend, on Saturday, June 1. Our URL remains the same: worcesterschools.org.
The new website is hosted by Apptegy, a leading provider of school district websites.
You may notice a disruption in website availability tonight, on Friday, May 31, or tomorrow, Saturday, June 1, while technological processes occur to launch the site. You may also notice that URLs for specific pages have changed once the new website launches.
New Website Overview
The website is online the face of the Worcester Public Schools and, for many families, their virtual welcome into the City of Worcester. Our hope is the website will showcase that WPS is a great place for students and families to learn and thrive, and a where you can easily find important information.
Using feedback from the staff and community website surveys of last fall, the new website is designed to make information easier to find with reorganized pages, updated content and elimination of overlapping content. We also aimed to increase visual appeal through original photography of WPS scholars, families, and staff.
A major focus has been increasing compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). In addition, the entire website can be translated into multiple languages.
The site menu (tabs across the top) includes lists of departments and offices; schools; School Committee; “Students and Families” with a new page for Family and Community Engagement; and “Learning” to showcase our Teaching and Learning Division; along with a tab for staff resources. We also have floating buttons that link to “Careers” and “Enroll.” We also refreshed our ParentSquare information page.
Staff Access
We are committed to increasing access for staff to update their respective school or department pages to better communicate with families and each other. On the back-end, Apptegy’s Thrillshare platform is much easier to use than the current website and includes a “live chat” support feature. Apptegy will continue to provide one-hour virtual training sessions for staff as needed.
Some Aspects Under Construction
On certain school pages, there are a number of sub-pages that are in process of being edited, primarily at the middle- and high-school levels.
In addition, because there are thousands of pages to review on the entire website, dating back at least 10 years, there are many pages that we are not able to edit currently and are likely outdated, and can be found by specifically searching for them. We will continue our work on those pages in the summer and beyond.
Provide Us Feedback
If you have any questions or feedback on the new website, please email the WPS Communications Office.
We hope you enjoy the new Worcester Public Schools website.
Sincerely,
Dan O’Brien
Chief Communications Officer
Worcester Public Schools