IPA Website
Awards of Excellence
“Awards of Excellence” is to recognize Sections who have met a set number of pre-established criteria in their website design. It is not a competition between Sections but rather a goal that each Section can strive to reach and be recognized for their efforts.
The best case outcome of this project is all IPA Sections achieve and maintain a gold level Award of Excellence each year and the obvious benefit to IPA is a series of top quality websites that can be accessed by our membership.
The review of websites for awards would be upon request from the Sections, not randomly selected by the ICC.
1. IPA websites will be reviewed by a panel of experts, to be determined.
2. The award image that can be placed on the successful website be designed for three levels (gold, silver and bronze, as an example) and presented along with a formal certificate. The levels of gold, silver and bronze would be determined by the number of the pre-established criteria that were met by the site. Only the gold certificates would be presented personally at the IEC or WC, the remainder of the certificates being distributed along with a list of all of the sites reviewed so that the current site addresses are provided. This site list will allow other sites to become current through us providing the current and accurate site addresses on an annual basis.
3. That a published list of criteria be established and circulated to all webmasters and Sections to include such items as this very draft list:
a. Service to members (e-mail distribution list etc.),
b. Clarity of the front page,
c. Useful links on the front page to lead members through the site,
d. Using search or survey engines,
e. Competitions,
f. Accessibility to other Sections (links),
g. Use of graphics,
h. Involvement of members of the Sections (place for members to provide comments),
i. Current content (is the site up to date?),
j. Tradition (history of the Section or regions; photo of Arthur Troop on the site),
k. Regional involvement,
l. Is the site user friendly (easy to move through),
m. Links to country tourist attractions, and
n. Entry code (members only portion).
Having the awards issued on an annual basis and the award image being dated will encourage the webmasters to constantly strive for improvement.