An Engaging, Informative, Organizing Tool
Our website will likely be among the first places members and the public go when looking for information about our battles for equity in California schools. For that reason, our collaboration in improving our web page designs and keeping our content fresh and easy to access is essential in providing our members and communities with the information they need to stay informed.
Here, you’ll find resources to help improve our web page designs, create engaging content, and other ways to inspire us as a community to work together in support of all students and educators.
Let’s work together to keep our website resource-rich, easy to use, and fight-ready to help us organize as we advocate for students, educators, and our communities across the state.
Have a Question or Want to Workshop a Web Page?
My office hours are Wednesday from 2 pm – 5 pm. Shoot me an email or text if you’d like to stop by!
Contact Me
Work cell: (415) 988-4986
Email: crobledo@cta.org
Document Center
We are phasing out the ability to upload documents (pdfs, Word, spreadsheets) to the media library of the website by January 1, 2024. After that date, the media folder will only house images, audio and video.
Documents should now be uploaded to the document center folder of the website. This new folder has features that make finding documents on the website much easier. Here are two features that will make our life’s a bit easier:
- Adding description text to the document. The description will show up under the search results.
- The ability to replace outdated documents by simply re-uploading a new one to the existing document in the folder.
Check out the tutorial video below.
IMPORTANT:
- Please begin transferring your documents from the media library to the document library. Be sure to delete your old documents from the media library. This will help me and Gladdie during the document content audit phase after the files are moved.
- Please only use the pre-existing categories as shown in the video. If you don’t see a category that matches your document, contact me and Gladdie so we can create one for you.
- We are working on moving all documents from the media library to the documents library of the website by January 1, 2024.
- When using document modules on a web page from now until January 1, 2024 you will still have the ability to use documents found in the media library.
Please email me if you have any questions.
Preview Images for Web Page and Educator Story Sharing on Social Media
As some of you probably know, Twitter is removing headlines from Tweets . Because of this, Facebook and Twitter preview images on Educator stories and webpages are more crucial than ever moving forward.
We need everyone to include a preview image for every web page and Educator story posted to the website. Ultimately, this helps increase the number of people who will view and click on our social media posts when sharing Educator stories and web pages.
Equally as important is to use a photo that represents the content of the web page you are sharing!
Why Preview Images are Important
Twitter is removing headlines from Tweets and our social media shares will rely heavily on images in that environment.
Why Part 2
Images grab our viewers attention. They increase the number of people who will view and click on our social media posts when sharing Educator stories and web pages.
How to Add Preview Images
See it on YouTube!
Canva Image Template
Use this Canva template for resizing your preview images to the correct dimensions. Just drag and drop in your image and move it around until all the important stuff is showing.
Alternative Text for Website Images
Do you fill out the alternative text (alt text) field when uploading images to the website? Or wondering what that field is for?
Check out the short video highlighting the importance of adding alt text whenever we upload images to the website. The critical thing to remember: adding alt text helps visually impaired persons get essential information from the web pages we’re publishing.
Our images help convey the information and messaging on our web pages, so we all must make the effort to add alt text to make the information accessible to all members and folx in our communities.
How To Write an Image Description
To further supplement the video, check out the How to write an image description article that is super helpful in explaining how to write great alt text descriptions and the importance of doing so.
Key Takeaways from the Article
What is alternative text?
- Alt text image is a text-based description of visual details in an image written primarily for visually impaired people (including blind/low vision). If an image fails to load on a website, alt text will be displayed in its place, and alt text is also used for search engine optimization.
Why is it important to include alt text in our images?
- Persons with disabilities may be using a screen reader on our web pages. (screen readers: A software application that enables people with visual impairments to use a computer. These screen readers tell them what is on the image by reading the alt text.)
- We want all our members and anyone coming to our website to be able to read all our content.
How to add alt text to your image
Object-action-context: An easy framework when writing an image description
- The object is the main focus. The action describes what’s happening, usually what the object is doing. The context describes the surrounding environment.
Call To Action
Let’s add alt text whenever we’re uploading images to the website. Doing this will be a game-changer for our members and folx in the community who consume content differently.
If you have thoughts about how you approach image descriptions or have questions, shoot me an email!
