By Tapuwa Manase
Girls High School (GHS) Harare www.ghs.ac.zw has revamped its school website so that it is used as a source of communication between the parents, guardians, and stakeholders. The school has also introduced a policy to reduce paper by having all applicants applying online and having their clearance forms being downloaded from the school website. This has been successful due to the professionalism and technical expertise of Hansole Investments, an ICT company based in Zimbabwe.
A school website is one of your most valuable communication tools during these times of COVID-19. Today’s digital revolution is transforming every facet of today’s schools and impacting school’s websites, moving the website from its traditional peripheral position to being the core and critical to the school’s everyday operations, its teaching, growth, evolution, and enhanced performance and productivity.
The time has come when schools and education authorities need to recognise this change and the profound implications that flow at both the school and education authority level.
In the traditional highly segmented, paper-based school the website has been viewed as but one of the many largely discrete parts of the school, largely peripheral to everyday teaching. In many instances it has been window dressing, sometimes very high-quality window dressing but in the main, it has done little to enhance school communication and student learning.
In Zimbabwe, the online experience has been viewed as separate from and lesser than the physical and the GHS website will transform this kind of thinking. With a school website, any school will be able to create its desired digital ecosystem and successfully realise its shaping educational and digital vision.
In today’s age and time where the likes of Apple, Amazon, Ok Zimbabwe, ZIMRA Tax Office are operating using their websites and you will begin to appreciate how critical having a web presence is to the growth of any organization.
It is good news that in Zimbabwe which has over 9000 schools, the teaching staff is now appreciating the importance of having a web presence. And once again we would like to say congratulations to GHS for taking the lead in creating a paperless working environment.