Uplift your school website

Hello, welcome to the School Website Uplift training. This is a training course that will guide you through how to uplift your own school website at your own pace. We have various resources such as video-walkthroughs, a pre-work document and templates in AEM to support you through the uplift.

I will begin by giving you a brief snapshot of this program.

1. Firstly you will be provided a pre-work document with sample copy and a content template to draft pages you may not already have such as the Canteen, Uniform, Bell-times, Parent App and Co-curricular pages.

2. Then you will be guided on how to use the AEM templates that we’re providing which includes ready-made components that you can copy and paste from to build out those new pages. Here is where the pre-work document you prepared in step 1 will come in handy as it means you will only have to copy and paste your content over to AEM.

3. Then you will be guided on how to uplift your homepage using the new pages you created and other components like the hero banner, divider and three columns which have been created in the template for you.

4. By the end of this process, you should be left with an uplifted website that will have a similar look and feel to the work we’ve done with schools like Hastings, Bass High and Murray High.

Register for AEM page templates

Before we get started, please make sure you register for the AEM page templates. The AEM templates will be covered in the next video.

Make a copy of the pre-work document

The first stage to get you started on your School Website Uplift journey is to complete the pre-work document which will help you collate information for the content that we know parents and prospective parents are after.

1. The link to this pre-work google document can be found on this page.

2. Click on file and then click on “Make a copy”.

3. Rename the document.

This pre-work is a prerequisite to the next training video. It’s important that you don’t rush this step to ensure that you have all the correct content you need to build these new pages in AEM. Sample copy and live examples will be provided throughout the pre-work document to help you create content, however they are just recommendations. Please make sure you double check the information and tailor it to your school wherever possible.

Homepage hero banner section

Going through this pre-work document, you will first see the “homepage hero banner” section which provides examples and options of copy that you can take to tailor and showcase your school’s unique selling point. Then we have some options you can take for the divider copy which sits below the homepage. Again you may customise this copy to convey another one of your school’s unique selling points or you may want to have it as an Acknowledgement of Country.

Images section

The “Images” section is a guide of recommended images required for the homepage uplift along with resources like the Department Brand Toolkit on Canva that your school can register for.

Recommended content pages section

And lastly, we have the “five recommended content pages” that we strongly urge you to draft into the templates if you don’t already have it on your website. The tables and text used in the template have already been created for you in AEM which we will show you how to access in the next video. So for the time-being, you can just focus on gathering your information and formatting it into easy-to-read tables.

Once you finalise your copy for the homepage, Canteen, Bell times, Uniform, Co-curricular programs and Parent app pages and gather your images - you may proceed with the next step which takes place in AEM.

Once you complete the pre-work template and gather all the relevant information and images, you can move onto the next stage which is using the AEM templates we have provided for you.

Where to find AEM templates

The AEM templates can be found on the same level as your homepage, labelled as 'Homepage template', and nested within it, the 'Canteen, Bell times, Uniform, Co-curricular and parent app templates'. In this stage of the website uplift, we will be touching on these five content pages first before touching the homepage. This is because the homepage hero banner component requires these content pages to be completed to be configured.

Before you start editing the templates, you want to make sure that the content page is in the correct location within your website.

If you already have the Canteen, Bell times, Uniform, Co-curricular and Parent app pages in your existing website:

1. Open the AEM template page in edit mode.

2. In a new tab, open the corresponding existing content page in edit mode.

3. Make these two tabs a split screen.

4. Now you can simply copy and paste components from the template that you desire over to your existing page.

5. Once you’re done copying over the components you need, you can close the AEM template page.

6. Proceed by opening your pre-work template and transfer the content you have prepared over to your content page.

7. Each template will come with a set of additional instructions and resources that will guide you on how to edit the components if you need additional help.

8. To access these additional resource links, click on Preview in the top left corner.

9. Once you have reviewed your content, you can publish the page.

If you don’t already have any of the Canteen, Bell times, Uniform, Co-curricular or Parent app pages on your website.

1. Click on the page icon of the template page that you want to copy over to your live school site.

2. Click copy.

3. Go to your school’s “Home” folder.

4. Find the appropriate folder for your page you are pasting.

5. Here is the recommended locations for you to paste each of the template pages:

   For Uniform, Canteen, Bell-times - we recommend the “About our school” section.

   For Co-curricular, we recommend the “Learning at our school” section.

   For the Parent App, we recommend the “Parents Information” section.

6. Once you find a suitable location to paste the template, open the template page in edit mode.

7. In a split screen, open your pre-work document.

8. Now copy and paste the information you’ve prepared in the pre-work onto AEM.

9. Each template will come with a set of additional instructions and resources that will guide you on how to edit the components if you need additional help.

10. To access these additional resource links, click on Preview in the top left corner.

11. Once you are done editing your page, in the top left corner, click on the second icon to "Open properties".

12. In the title field, remove the word "template".

13. In the meta-description field, add in the page title like this example format, “Canteen information at Murray High School”

14. Click "Save & Close". 

15. Once you have reviewed your content, you can publish the page.

By the end of this process, you should have published your very own Canteen, Bell times, Uniform, Co-curricular or Parent app pages.

The next stage of the uplift process is the homepage. Before you begin with this video, please make sure you have your Canteen, Bell times, Uniform, Co-curricular and Parent app pages published and ready.

The homepage uplift process consists of two parts:

1. Hero banner component
2. Using the homepage template

The first part of the homepage uplift will be setting up the hero banner component. Then, we will proceed with part 2 which will go through the list of components from the AEM template that you can use for your own homepage.

How to use the Hero banner component

1. First in the full width “Drag components here” bar, click the plus sign and add the hero banner component.

2. Click the spanner icon of the hero banner component to edit it.

3. Open up your pre-work document in a split screen.

4. In the Banner Type tab of the component, ensure that Image is selected from the drop down menu.

5. Proceed to the second tab labelled image.

6. Ensure that “Static image” is selected from the drop-down menu.

7. Select or upload the homepage hero image you prepared in the pre-work document.

8. Give your image an alt text for accessibility.

9. Copy and paste the banner title.

10. Copy and paste your school description.

11. For Link, which is where the hero banner button will be directed to, press the tick and select your school’s “Enrolment page”.

12. For Link title, which is the text of the hero banner button, you can use “Enrol your child”.

13. Next, scroll back up and go to the third tab labelled “Content”

14. In the drop down, select “Tiles content”

15. Click “add”.

16. This is where you add the Bell times, Canteen, Parent Portal and Uniforms pages.

17. Copy and paste the generic tile title and tile description from the pre-work document over.

18. For the Tile Link, press the tick and select the correct page.

19. For the Link title, you can use “read more”.

20. Press the tick in the top left corner of the Hero Banner box to save your changes.

21. Double check to make sure that the links are directed to the correct page.

After completing the hero banner, you can continue with the rest of the homepage uplift.

How to use the homepage template for your homepage uplift

1. Open the Homepage template alongside your school homepage in two separate tabs.

2. Make these two tabs a split screen.

3. Now you can freely copy and paste components from the homepage template over to your site to use.

You can also reference the example school websites that have been uplifted like Hastings, Bass High and Murray High as a source of inspiration.

The layouts and components from the template are merely recommendations for you to customise your homepage with.

Divider component

1. The component we recommend to follow the hero banner is the divider component which you can copy and paste from the template onto your homepage.

2. Copy and paste the divider copy from the pre-work document over. You may also add an additional link which you can add to link to pages like your “About us” page.

Card component

Next you can continue to customise your homepage with the card component which you can use to feature news articles or unique pages that your school offers. For example Murray High School has a “Wall of honour” page which celebrates alumni, or Hastings has a news feature about new upgraded facilities that they want to promote to prospective parents.

Three column component

You can also use the three column component from the template to surface some additional content.

1. The first card item is “Enrol now” which links directly to the school-finder website.
2. The second card item can be your own “Our teachers” page or anything else you want to promote.
3. The third card item can be the co-curricular page. This is entirely up to you to customise according to your school’s needs.

The rest of the page contains more components that you can copy and paste depending on what your school is actively updating like “Upcoming events”, “Gallery” or “Social links”.

Before you publish your uplifted homepage

Please ensure that you have changed all the placeholder images in the card items, review all sample copy and check links.

Once you are confident, click publish.

Congratulations. This takes you to the very end of the website uplift training module. What you should have now is an uplifted homepage along with five core content pages that complement it. Thank you for following along and as always, please reach out to us via the SWS Viva Engage channel for more support.