Why do we like this site?

Pakuranga College is a secondary school of 1800 students from ages 13 to 17 in Auckland, open to students in the immediate area, with limited enrollment available to students outside the immediate Auckland area and internationally. Its website contains almost every major feature we look for in the School of the Month, and we're very pleased to feature it for September.

First, there's the basic issue of site design. The Pakuranga site makes uses of consistent color schemes with dark text on a light background. This may sound too terribly simplistic, but you'd be surprised; so many websites seem to think flashy colors are easier to read. They are not. Additionally, the table of contents (ubiquitously present on the left-hand border of every page), as the one featured last month was also designed, gives the appearance of multiple, distinct images when actually it's one large imagemap. This means only one http connection has to be opened to get the info. It's a thoughtful touch which makes the site more pleasant for the user.

Another point in its favor is the amount of student work available on the site, particularly the poetry and short fiction. Not only is the work itself top notch, those students are getting exposure to their work and being rewarded for their efforts by their school. Something as simple as that can make all the difference for a student, and it lends the school site a great deal more personality.

Best of all, though, is the sheer volume of information available about the school. Everything from test scores to student work to homework assignments, departmental links, school calendars and information on how to contact the administration, faculty and staff. The complete package makes for a website which is easy to navigate, technologically advanced (be sure to check out the streaming video from the school's in-house news program; there's also a WWW tutorial written and designed specifically for Pakuranga-affiliated web users), and informative. All this together makes the Pakurange College our Star School of the Month.

Who are the people behind this site?

The Pakuranga College site is maintained by staff and students who do web design and systems administration.