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Today we're really excited to announce a new feature that has been in the works for over six months now.  Those of you who have reading incentive programs for the kids at your elementary school will love this.  At our school, our reading incentive program is called "Eager Reader", and typically runs for a few weeks.  Kids are encouraged to read at home, keep track of their minutes, and they can earn prizes based on the number of minutes they read.  In the past, we've always given them a paper form to track their minutes, and we had an army of volunteers whose sole job it was to decipher the kids' handwriting, tally up the minutes, and hand out prizes.  Well, last year, for the first time, we did it all electronically through our website, and it was fantastic!  Kids loved going online to the PTSA website and entering their minutes into their own personal online reading log.  Parents loved it because they could easily sign in to their own accounts to approve their kids' minutes and see their progress.  But our volunteers were absolutely delirious when we handed them a spreadsheet each week already populated with the list of ...

Our School Pages will be offering online interactive training sessions on the following days and times.  Get first hand assistance with customizing your website and making the most of the features available.  All you have to do is just be at your computer at the designated time.  Our expert web master will spend the first ten minutes going over the main features of the website.  After that, you can ask questions specific to your own school or PTA, and watch step-by-step as he shows you how to get your website to do exactly what you want. Click the appropriate link below to see our web master's screen, and dial in the phone number to join the conference call for audio.  Questions?  Send email to info@ourschoolpages.com . Note:  All times are Pacific Time Tuesday, August 28, 2012 1:00pm - 1:30pm CANCELED Sorry everyone, we needed to cancel this one due to a scheduling conflict on our end.  Please contact us at info@ourschoolpages.com to schedule a private training session if you are in need of assistance.  (future dates to be announced)     ...

There is a lot of talk today about SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act), a bill which Congress is beginning to debate today.  The goal of the legislation is to put an end to online piracy, the illegal distribution of digital copyrighted works.  Nearly everyone I know in the tech industry has voiced opposition to the bill, and major websites like Wikipedia , Google , and Wired.com have made a strong statement by blacking out parts of their websites for 24 hours.  A lot of claims are flying around about why the bill is unconstitutional and will destroy our First Amendment rights.  I'm sure many of the claims are accurate, but at the same time, it's clear that some people like to exaggerate in order to make their point, and many don't always know the hard facts.  Eventually, the flurry of opinions from various sources overwhelmed me to the point of not knowing who to believe. So I read the actual text of the bill .  Yup, all 76 pages.  As you'd expect, it was not an easy read, but I got through it, and I think I understand it.  I'm not quite ready to give my own opinion of the ...

I don’t think I know anybody who enjoys flying.  Young kids sometimes find it exciting, and George Clooney’s character in Up In The Air certainly had it down to a science.  But beyond that, I can’t think of anyone.  Given the lack of any other practical option, we’ll put up with it and are even grateful that we have technology which enables us to visit family and friends.  But the flying itself, even when nothing goes wrong, is a positively unenjoyable experience.  There are some obvious reasons, like the expense, the crowds, the confined spaces, the long lines, the strip downs, the pat downs, the uncomfortable seats, the lost luggage, the rush to get to the airport on time, and airplane bathrooms that are smaller than my refrigerator.  But I wondered if there was a more fundamental underlying cause that could explain our displeasure. Some have suggested that fundamentally it’s the lack of control that is the common thread in all our complaints.  Indeed most aspects of air travel are out of our control, and when we can’t control our environment, it adds some stress.  That makes sense.  But today, I had five hours seated in a cramped uncomfortable seat ...