Why each school needs a website

By Peter Kamuri

Does your former school own a website? I recently posed this question to a group of friends and I was shocked. Out of the five, only one who answered to the affirmative.

Although public schools are presumed to be the hub through which information and communication technology (ICT) can spread to the population, it is worrying to see majority of them lack websites.

A few years back, few institutions created websites. This was mainly left to the corporate world since Internet penetration was low and less popular. Today, the Internet has gained more popularity and it is all the rage.

Although creating a website is a fairly inexpensive, many schools do not have one. Yet, it is a tool that can bring new experiences to students, teachers and other stakeholders of a school.

run as business

With the unprecedented growth in the ICT sector, it is frustrating to do a simple Internet search to get information about a particular school, only to find it lacks a website.

According to Peter Kimani, an IT consultant at Kenya Website Experts Limited along Tom Mboya Street in Nairobi, schools should be run like a business.

 “By having a web presence, a school can increase its market considerably as it will be more visible. This visibility is not only for those people near the school, but even for those who are far across the globe, achieved through very minimal costs.”

need for a website

Running a school today without a website is like groping in darkness. You do not have a chance to tell people what you are doing. Nobody will know about you. Having a website means people can reach you all the time.

 “Having a presence through the Internet is different from having the name in a printed directory. Here, it is cheap and the information can last longer and changed conveniently,” says Kimani.

According to Alex Onguso, a computer teacher at Naivasha Girls High school, having a website enables a school to share information with others easily just at a click of the button.

 “A school website can enable students and teachers to have the convenience of sharing information. Students can post articles on the site and share with their classmates,” he says.