This exploratory study examined Florida "A" high school Webmasters perceptions on faculty use of Internet school websites. Variables studied in relationship to the extent of use of the WWW site for curricular and instructional support purposes included the following: Webmaster age, Webmaster years of experience, Webmaster fraction of time devoted to the function, school student enrollment, and school White student fraction. Webmasters were surveyed regarding their perceptions. A total of 33 surveys were returned for an effective response rate of 61.11%. A model was also presented for World Wide Web (WWW) site development. Curricula, instructional support, and other content items for consideration on a school WWW site were also presented. Further, fifty "A" school WWW sites were reviewed for these items. Collected data were coded and entered into an SPSS data base. The data revealed that only a small fraction of the faculty were posting curricular and instructional support information to the school WWW site. Webmasters believed that many problems faced teachers in their use of the school WWW site. Time was the most frequently listed problem, followed in order by willingness to use, knowledge or experience, ease of use or access, and support. The Webmasters believed that existing policies concerning their WWW sites were adequate. Foreseen plans for their websites tended to not involve changes in site purpose, although some schools and districts were implementing changes to allow teachers to directly post material to the school WWW site rather than going through the Webmaster. Finally, the data showed that a significant positive correlation existed between the fraction of time the Webmaster devoted to the Webmaster function and the extent of use of the WWW site for curricular and instructional support purposes. The implication for educational leaders was that many factors over which they have considerable control do affect teachers in their use of the school WWW site. Educational leaders can help generate receptiveness towards use of the WWW site for curricular and instructional support purposes by influencing pre-service and in-service training programs, by allowing teachers administrative time to maintain the school WWW site, by surveying school personnel regarding improvement of the school WWW site, and by updating their technology plan to reflect goals on improved utilization of the school WWW site.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:ucf.edu/oai:stars.library.ucf.edu:rtd-2739 |
| Date | 01 January 2002 |
| Creators | Wunderlich, Erwin J. |
| Publisher | University of Central Florida |
| Source Sets | University of Central Florida |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | text |
| Source | Retrospective Theses and Dissertations |
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