Schools’ wish lists gone
By Bobbi Mlynar
Originally published 02:10 p.m., October 2, 2007
Updated 02:10 p.m., October 2, 2007
The technology that brought the Grant-a-Wish Web page to the Emporia school district was, in its own way, responsible for the page’s demise.
The page included a long list of items teachers wished they had for their classrooms. Items ranged from inexpensive glue sticks to more expensive wants and needs, like teachers’ chairs and cassette recorders.
Names of the donors often were posted next to the wish that had been fulfilled; however, many donors chose to remain anonymous.
For the first year, a number of citizens and businesses in the community responded by donating — often anonymously — some of the items on the list. After the initial spurt of interest, the wish list fell into disuse.
“The first year, it was used a lot and we had some significant contributions come in — everything from books and supplies to digital cameras,” said Nancy Horst, community relations director for the district. “... And so it was very valuable during the time we had it. But during the second year, use really dropped to a snail’s pace.”
The determining factor on canceling the wish page was a change in the e-mail system used by the district.
The Grant-A-Wish Web page program, designed and written by district web and electronic media manager Dave Leiker, was a two-sided program that allowed the community to look at the teachers’ lists of wishes and, on the other side, allowed teachers to e-mail their wishes to building principals. A wish would be posted after approval from the teacher involved.
Leiker also had built in a security feature for the program to verify the authenticity of the e-mailed requests received by principals. That feature was incompatible with the new e-mail system.
“Dave was going to have to invest significant time to build that system,” Horst said. “Because its use had been so (limited) in the second year, it was my recommendation that we take it down until we could do something different.”
Horst said that because of limited financial resources and ever-increasing demands for Leiker’s skills, coupled with limited use of the wish page, the district could not continue to make the page a priority.
“Otherwise, we wouldn’t have just arbitrarily taken it down,” she said. “Once it came down, it really wasn’t even noticed.”
MakesYouGoHm (anonymous) says...
I never knew this list existed. How do we find out what we can do to assist and support our educators now? The children are our future!
October 3, 2007 at 11:19 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )