NOAC Website Results - 2004
This year's NOAC featured a website competion. Our Lodge finished with 84.4, but 90 was required to be a NOAC 2004 National Honor Site. Our goal is to share the numbers and then solicit ideas to help improve them. Comments and Suggestions are always welcome
Content | |||
| Category/Question | Possible | Received | |
| 1. | Content on the site is appropriate to the Scouting movement OA Web Site Guidelines #2 | 4 | 4 |
| 2. | The site homepage features an event within three months of the date judged (past or future) | 5 | 3 |
| Our comments/response: Looks like a judging error or some confusion on what constitutes an event. Our calendar certainly listed events and there were news items about Powder Horn and Summer Camp, later there was reference to NOAC. | |||
| 3. | A calendar of upcoming and recent events is easily available. The calendar should provide event descriptions or links to more information. | 3 | 3 |
| 4. | A portion of the site has been updated within three months. | 4 | 4 |
| 5. | Contact information for at least one lodge leader (i.e. chief, adviser, staff adviser) is readily available | 4 | 4 |
| 6. | Basic information about the lodge and the council it serves is readily available. | 3 | 3 |
| Section Totals | 23 | 21 | |
Judges Comments for this sectionGood Use of ContentThere is so much content on the homepage that anyone could get any news about this lodge. This is great content Ok Looks good. | |||
Design | |||
| Category/Question | Possible | Received | |
| 7. | Each page is devoted to a single topic (Exception: homepage or index pages if used to provide short descriptions of and link to several different areas) | 4 | 4 |
| 8. | Pages effectively utilize white space in addition to text and graphics for a pleasing layout | 4 | 2.4 |
| 9. | Colors on the site complement each other, are coordinated, and are pleasing to the eye | 5 | 3.6 |
| 10. | Pages throughout the site use a consistent layout, font selection, and style (Note: different sections of the site may have different styles, but pages within the same section should have the same style) | 5 | 4.6 |
| Our comments/response: This is also likely a judging error - except for the home page, all pages are identical - they even come from the same source. | |||
| Section Totals | 18 | 14.6 | |
Judges Comments for this sectionThe home page has two navigation menus, one one the left and one on top. When you got to the other pages, the left menu leaves. May want to maintain the left navigation bar on all pages. The pages are very long. May want to reorganize the content. The home page content extends way beyond the left navigation bar. May want to revise.The design is nice and smooth. Very good. The design of the site is great but I think maybe just organize it a little better. Work on reducing white space. The red is very bright, think about toning it down. | |||
Pizazz | |||
| Category/Question | Possible | Received | |
| 11. | Pages use photos and other graphics to enhance written content | 5 | 2.8 |
| 12. | Pages use buttons and other graphics to assist in the formatting and appearance of the page beyond simply enhancing content | 5 | 3.8 |
| 13. | The site is accented by browser toolbar icons, animations, or other multimedia features that do not detract from the purpose of the site | 4 | 4 |
| 14. | If used, animations such as Flash or animated GIFs load quickly, are easily skipped or stopped, and are not required for site navigation | 2 | 2 |
| 15. | If used, video or other bandwidth-intensive multimedia files are provided in both highbandwidth and low-bandwidth versions | 1 | 1 |
| Section Totals | 17 | 13.6 | |
Judges Comments for this sectionGood Use of graphicsI like how the menu is set up and how it links itself to the eagle. Maybe I could talk to the webmaster and get hints on how to do it. Great. Need more pics and use of buttons. Add more pics. It keeps people looking at the content on the site. | |||
Guidelines and Technical Compliance. | |||
| Category/Question | Possible | Received | |
| 16. | The site does not contain any unprotected safeguarded information (i.e. OA ceremonies), BSA Supply Division materials, or commercial advertisements or materials (except for an acknowledgement of the hosting service) OA Web Site Guidelines #3-6 | 4 | 4 |
| 17. | A method to contact the webmaster is easy to find OA Web Site Guidelines #9 | 3 | 3 |
| 18. | If the site collects any personally identifying information, a privacy policy is clearly visible on all pages where data is collected | 3 | 3 |
| 19a. | The site contains links to its council’s web site | 1 | 1 |
| 19b. | The site contains links to its section’s web site Yes | 1 | .8 |
| Our comments/response: One of the 5 judges must not have found them as they are there. | |||
| 19c. | The site contains links to its region’s web site Yes | 1 | .8 |
| Our comments/response: One of the 5 judges must not have found them as they are there. | |||
| 19d. | The site contains links to the National Order of the Arrow web site | 1 | 1 |
| 20. | Pages contain no apparent copyright or intellectual property violations OA Web Site Guidelines #7 | 3 | 3 |
| 21. | When the homepage is run through the W3C Validator tool to test standards compliance, there are few errors (http://validator.w3.org/) | 5 | 0 |
| Our comments/response: This has been addressed and we would now score 5 points. | |||
| Section Totals | 22 | 16.6 | |
Judges Comments for this sectionComplies.All guidelines and technical compliances met. Great. OK Need to add links to the section and region web site. | |||
Usability and accessibility | |||
| Category/Question | Possible | Received | |
| 22. | Text is easy to read and user can change the font size without making the page unusable | 4 | 4 |
| 23. | Page titles (in title bar) are unique for each page | 2 | 2 |
| 24. | All images used for page content make appropriate use of alternative text tags that are accurate, succinct, and descriptive | 3 | 2.4 |
| Our comments/response: Another case where one of the 5 appears to have scored us a 0 while the others gave us 3 points. | |||
| 25. | Each page has a navigation bar or similar way to get to all the main areas of the web site | 4 | 3.2 |
| Our comments/response: One of the 5 judges thought the left buttons on the home page should have stayed, maybe that's why we got four 4's and a 0. | |||
| 26. | All critical sections of the page (i.e. navigation bar, major content) appear acceptably in the viewer’s normal browser. (Note: Lodge web sites should be functional in a wide variety of platforms and browsers) | 4 | 4 |
| 27. | Pages download within 2 minutes, even on slow connections | 3 | 3 |
| Section Totals | 20 | 18.6 | |
Judges Comments for this sectionSee comment above about left navigation bar.Very nice. I was able to go anywhere and do anything. Great. No Alt tags Looks Ok. | |||
Total Score | 100 | 84.4 | |
General Comments
The judges were also asked to provide general comments:Nice site. Minor spelling errors, please double-check the content.
This website was great, very nice in content.
Good site, keep it up.
Site is overall very informative.
Our evaluation and action plan
Content
It appears we need little improvement here - the only lost points appear to be a judging error.
Design
Two comments here are related - the "too much white space" and the "two navigation menus" are related. If we get rid of those left buttons we'll have considerably less white space.
The comment about the red is a repeat from 2002 and we've toned down considerably since then. There may just be one guy who judges sites for NOAC who hates red.
Numerically this is one of the two weakest sections. It would appear we need to improve our design, color scheme and layout.
Pizazz
The comments and the scoring make it clear that we need to add more pictures and graphics to our site.
Guidelines and Technical Compliance
The big error here was the validator test. This has been addressed on the home page and will gradually be checked for all pages.
The only other error was someone missing our links to region and section. Maybe we'll figure out how to put them on the new front page.
Usability and Accessibility
Eliminating the left navigation bar would remove the judge's confusion and score improvements in other key areas. It's a goner.
I'm not sure which pictures were not assigned alt tags. The validator (see Compliance above) will reveal them though so we should find them.
