ASU West assignment:  Research ten websites and analyze them regarding the following elements:

• use of color
• graphics
• organization of data
• speed to load pages
• quality

The following scale is used in evaluating the websites:

		Excellent
		Very good -- needs some improvement
		Needs considerable improvement
		Needs a complete makeover

Edwin Forrest Elementary School
1/2
With only three small pictures of the school, and a mostly black and white format, you would think this would be a boring site.  Yet its simplicity was compelling and elegant.  In addition to a navigation bar at the bottom and left side of each page, the home page provided a description of each link in the navigation bar.  Like topics were clustered together and each page loaded very quickly.  I would have given this site four stars if it didn't have a few minor flaws such scrolling on the home page and a totally different layout on one of its navigation pages.

Georgia O'Keeffe Elementary School

This site met all the right criteria, but its color scheme was boring.  Maybe the contrast between the colors of turquoise and white wasn't striking enough.  However, the pages loaded quickly, a navigation bar was on the side and bottom of each page, and most of the pages were aligned.  One pet peeve was that the navigation bar had too many buttons.  Like categories were not clustered together.  You had to click to a new page for every single topic.

Grant Elementary

A black and white color scheme with minimal use of turquoise bars kept the look clean, simple, and professional.  Pages loaded quickly and contained only a few small pictures of the school.  Even the student work page had pictures small enough to decrease download time.  A rollover navigation bar was on the left of each page.

Claire Lilienthal Alternative School

This site had no unifying theme.  The home page consisted of a picture and a list of links.  No color scheme or graphic design tied the pages together.  Pages had mixed alignments and some pages were simply spreadsheets.  Pages did load relatively quickly and the link descriptors were accurate.

Harelson Elementary

A red side navigation bar makes a striking statement on each page.  The school mascot is used as a background motif.  Pages load quickly and a new window opens up for outside links.  However, some links were broken and the navigation bar was too lengthy.  Similar topics should have been consolidated.

Manhattan School for Children
1/2
This school would definitely get four stars except for one small error.  Once you start using the navigation buttons, there is not an obvious way to return to the home page.  Otherwise, this site has it all.  I'm sure some professional web designer was paid good money.  Great art deco look.  All pages have the same style with a different children's drawing on each page.  Great information, easy to use.  Quick and colorful.

Peoria Unified School District

The strength of this site is that it offers a lot of information, and you don't have to dig deep to find it.  However, this means that the home page is quite lengthy.  Even if they took away the many current district news bulletins, you'd still have to scroll down to see all of the navigation buttons.  Each page within in the website has a different look.  A few of the pages stick with the red and blue color scheme or have a small graphic of the district logo, but overall, it looks like a different person designed each web page.  No continuity.

National Geographic

This website is optimized for low-end browsers.   Content is set in a table centered on a background of black.  Not only is this layout striking, but of course the graphics are great.  Even though there are lots of photos, pages still load fairly quickly.  All gallery links take you to a description with thumbnails of the pictures.  Once you click on a thumbnail, you are taken into the main gallery which consists of one large picture and a description per page.  Drawbacks:  scrolling on the homepage.  Not all pages have an easy to find link back to the homepage.

Sylvan Learning Centers

A dynamic splash page imitates an advertisement you might watch on TV.  The entire site using a blue and peach color scheme with a variety of student pictures on each page.  Pages load quickly, relevant content is easy to get, and each page has several navigation options.  An added bonus is a pop-up window that allows you to talk live with a Sylvan expert through an online chat or "Instant Live Talk."

Crayola

Tons of great information in a very easy to find format.  A table formatted to fit low-end resolution sits on top of a colored background.  Parents and educators get a different colored background.  The kids get a more interactive page using macromedia.  Even though lots of color is used, pages load quickly because the same layout is used on each page.