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Creating a Troop Web Page

Creating a Troop Page

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Troop Pages 		Creating a Troop Web Page

Girl Scouts of the USA (GSUSA) has recently issued a comprehensive document, Guidelines for Creating Your Own Troop or Group Web Page. Rolling Hills offers it here in two file formats:
       Word file
       Acrobat pdf file

The following five steps for creating safe web sites or pages should be used in order to protect the safety of girls in cyberspace:

Step 1 - Complete the Online Safety Pledge with each girl and her parent/guardian. Child and teen safety tips are also available at Safe Kids Online (www.safekids.com) and the US Department of Education has a Parents Guide to the Internet online at www.ed.gov/pubs/parents/internet.

Step 2 - Carefully choose a web site hosting service provider. Many sites that provide free hosting also contain advertising (for instance, AOL's Hometown, Yahoo's Geocities, Tripod, Angelfire, etc). The ads are often colorful and contain animation that attracts girls' attention. Can you be sure that the ads are always appropriate?

Clubspaces.com offers free web space and easy-to-use templates for organizations. It offers many features including the ability to set up password-protected areas.

Many ISPs (Internet Service Providers) offer free personal web space with their accounts with no advertising. It may be that one of your troop families has an ISP web account they are not using and would be willing to allow your troop to use it.

Step 3 - Think carefully about how you want to represent your troop and Girl Scouting. Web sites or pages on the Internet are read by people all over the world. Be mindful of the Safety Guidelines regarding personal identification of girls. Girls should never post personal information about themselves or family members. Obtain written parental consent for girls' pictures to appear, using the Photo Release for Minors form.

Step 4 - Any hyperlinks you create between your site and other sites should be done very carefully. Ask and receive permission to create a link between your web site and another site. Periodically recheck the appropriateness of the link as well as for broken links.

Step 5 - Don't forget to let the Girl Scouts of Rolling Hills Council know about your troop's web site by submitting the online Troop Web Information form. You may request a link from the council's web site when you submit the form.
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