West Virginia Education Portal Recognized Twice for Innovation in National Competitions
Monday September 22, 12:56 pm ET
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CHARLESTON, W.Va.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--The recently unveiled West Virginia Education portal (http://www.education.wv.gov) has been declared one of the best education Websites in the nation by the Centers for Digital Government and Education. The new portal was presented the 2008 Best of Web Special Award and the 2008 Digital Education Achievement Award based on its innovative approach to integrating more than 900 education resources into one centralized starting point located within the state’s official Website, http://www.wv.gov.
“We were very pleased to finally see a state develop a comprehensive education component into their overall state Website strategy,” said Cathilea Robinett, Executive Director of the Center for Digital Government. “The West Virginia Education Portal takes the right approach to providing diverse online education resources to West Virginia’s citizens.”
The Best of Web Awards and Digital Education Achievement Awards are national programs that recognize outstanding agency and department Websites and applications that enhance information interactions, transactions, and services. The awards were presented by the Centers for Digital Government and Education, which are national research and advisory institutes on information technology policies and best practices in government and education, during the 21st Century Jobs Cabinet meeting on September 19 in Charleston.
“West Virginia is the first state in the nation to develop a centralized online resource for families to seamlessly access the numerous educational offerings in the state,” said First Lady Gayle Manchin. “These awards highlight the commitment of the state of West Virginia to improving the educational opportunities for our citizens and educators.”
The education portal is the result of the work of the 21st Century Jobs Cabinet, which was formed in 2006 to promote a seamless education system that connects every level of education from early childhood to graduate study. It encompasses job training and lifelong learning to both support and enhance West Virginia's job creation and economic development efforts.
The West Virginia Education Portal was built without using taxpayer dollars by leveraging an innovative public-private partnership between the state and West Virginia Interactive, a Charleston-based subsidiary of eGovernment firm NIC (NASDAQ: EGOV - News). Additional services are slated to be released in the upcoming months that will further streamline citizen access to government services and save taxpayer dollars.
About WV.gov
WV.gov is the official Website of the state of West Virginia (http://www.wv.gov) and is the result of an innovative public-private partnership between the state and West Virginia Interactive. West Virginia Interactive works with government agencies to build and manage interactive online services and is a subsidiary of eGovernment firm NIC.
About NIC
NIC manages more eGovernment services than any provider in the world. The company helps government communicate more effectively with citizens and businesses by putting essential services online. NIC provides eGovernment solutions for 2,900 state and local agencies that serve more than 70 million people in the United States. Additional information is available at http://www.nicusa.com.
Contact:
The Office of Governor Joe Manchin
Lara Ramsburg, 304-558-2000
Communications Director
or
WV.gov
Peter Fairhurst, 304-414-0265 ext. 103
General Manager
Tuesday, September 23, 2008
Education a Priority in West Virginia
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2 comments:
Cool site. Lots of resources. Some buried. Some not. 21century skills is what we are talking about in Idaho.
As a librarian (of course), I would love to see the statewide library databases be more up front. Even have a search box for that. You would think with the money spent on those, they would want an obvious place to showcase that.
Otherwise, if you were a student, I am not sure if you would go to this website for anything. A parent or teacher, yes.
Rick, this is awesome input. Thank you for taking the time to visit the site and suggest something that will, in my opinion, enhance the site for all visitors.
Any type of website is a living thing that must continually evolve in order to remain useful. I feel that principle applies especially to targeted information portals such as this one, and I am looking forward to finding ways to integrate library services into the system.
Like government, libraries are undergoing a massive transformation into digital and further-reaching entities. It makes perfect sense, to me, to integrate the two as closely as possible.
It's an exciting time to be a nerd.
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