Katie Crossett
NYS Forum Intern
Nelson A. Rockefeller College of Public Affairs and Policy
University at Albany
Debi Orton
Manager of IT
NYS Governor's Office of Employee Relations and Co-Chair, NYS Forum's IT Accessibility Committee
Michael B. Short
Webmaster
NYS Department of Civil Service and Co-Chair, NYS Forum's IT Accessibility Committee
Paul Maguire
Project Manager
NYS Office of Alcoholism and Substance Abuse Services and Co-Chair, NYS Forum's Webmasters' Guild
August 2005
New York State Forum
Rockefeller Institute of Government
411 State Street
Albany, NY 12203
Phone (518) 443-5001
Fax (518) 443-5006
E-mail info@nysfirm.org
Web www.nysfirm.org
Mastering the Web Revolution in New York State Agencies
New York State Forum Government Information Focus
August 2005
Katie Crossett
Debi Orton
Michael B. Short
Paul Maguire
Contents
Executive Summary...ii
Acknowledgements...iv
Introduction: Background on Standards and Accessibility....1
Usability and Accessibility
Best Practices and Standards
The Digital Divide
Critical Success Factors
Current New York State Forum Initiatives
Forum Committees Addressing Information Technology Accessibility
The Research Effort: Survey and Focus Group Findings....5
December Online Survey on Web Development
Survey Respondents' Concerns
Short-Term Survey Response
Focus Group Sessions
Best Practices Found Across Agencies....12
Action Recommendations for the NYS Forum....13
Training and Education
Operational Management
Leadership Understanding and Support
References....14
Appendices....15
Online Web Developer Survey
Pre-Focus Group Questionnaire
Focus Group Discussion Topics
Press Release
The NYS Forum has a long history of working in support of those who develop state and local government web sites. The Forum's Webmasters' Guild (WMG) was created in 1995 and in November, 2003, the IT Accessibility Committee was created as a spin-off of the WMG to specifically address the broad context characterized by the "digital divide." This white paper is focused on the usability of government web sites across the entire, intended audience and is particularly targeted on issues related to whether a website is fully accessible to users that have one or more disabilities.
The NYS Office for Technology (OFT) first recognized the need to address issues of usability and accessibility in September, 1999 with the issuance of Technology Policy 99-3: Universal Accessibility for NYS Web Sites. In June, 2004, NYS Technology Policy P04-002 and NYS Mandatory Technology Standards S04-001 were issued. The Forum's IT Accessibility Committee and WMG worked in close collaboration with the NYS Office for Technology on the formulation of those policies, their subsequent implementation, and the creation of education and training programs designed to provide web developers with the skills and competencies to meet the standards.
With new policies put in place in 2004, The NYS Forum committees felt it would be of great value to determine what training and education was needed by web development employees and to what extent agencies were complying with the policy standards. To answer these questions, The Forum conducted an online survey involving 226 New York State government employees and follow-up focus group sessions designed to refine the findings of the online survey.
The online survey found great diversity across agencies related to (1) how web development is organized within agencies, (2) the level of professional preparation individuals have, and (3) the authoring tools in use. In addition, respondents indicated that among the perceived barriers to producing fully compliant web pages were:
The follow-up focus groups further delved into these issues and the in-depth discussions that took place clustered around six major areas:
Focus groups also identified the following as some of the best practices of agencies with successful web development organization:
As a result of analyzing the results of both the online survey and focus group discussions, the following Action Recommendations for the NYS Forum were posited by the authors:
Training and Education:
Operational Management:
Leadership Understanding and Support:
These recommendations are being taken into consideration as potential initiatives of The Forum's IT Accessibility Committee and WMG for the 2005-2006 program year that commences on October 1, 2005.
This research publication of The NYS Forum results from the work of Katie Crossett who served as an intern for a 12-week period in the spring of 2005. Katie reviewed the results of The Forum's December, 2004 online survey, developed and administered the follow-up pre-focus group questionnaires and solicited participation, organized and administered the focus group sessions held in February, 2005. Following the focus groups during the period March through May, 2005, Katie worked with NYS Forum staff and co-chairs of The Forum's IT Accessibility and Webmasters' Guild to analyze the rich information yielded by the focus groups, align it with the online survey data on hand and distill those findings into a set of clear action recommendations for The NYS Forum to integrate into its 2005-2006 program year and beyond.
In May, 2005 Katie was awarded a Masters in Public Administration with concentrations in Human Resource Management from the Nelson A. Rockefeller College of Public Administration. The NYS Forum wishes Katie well in all that she pursues.
The interest of The NYS Forum's membership in IT accessibility and the broader issues inherent to the "digital divide" have been largely addressed by The Forum's IT Accessibility Committee and Webmasters' Guild. There is good reason for this concentration of effort by these committees since it is New York government's web presence that represents the vital, virtual interface between state government information/services and New York's citizenry. This important work - indeed this research publication - would not have been possible without the tireless contributions of Debi Orton and Michael Short, Co-Chairs of the IT Accessibility Committee and Paul Maguire, Co-Chair of the Webmasters' Guild.
The foundation of all research efforts is the data from which implications and direction might be derived. The contributions of Milena Ivanova, The NYS Forum's Technical Coordinator, were key to the collection and organization of the December, 2004 online web developer survey that provided the foundation for this initiative.
The above persons and the contributions of many more yielded this important publication which constructed the rationale for seven concise "action recommendations" for the NYS Forum. The NYS Forum staff and membership are grateful for these contributions.
Last, the contribution of time that yielded thoughtful responses and discussions by nearly 250 New York State web developers is the core of this research effort. The NYS Forum has great respect for the investment of time made by its membership and trusts that the actions and outcomes resulting from this research effort and the investment of member time will yield a significant return on both individual and public investment.
Background on Standards and Accessibility
Since the early 1990s, New York State agencies have been migrating information and service delivery from brick-and-mortar offices to the World Wide Web. As in most organizations at that time, the origin and speed of this migration varied widely from state agency to state agency. Because of the relative newness of the technology and the nature of the Internet, the skills of the staff effecting this migration also varied widely. The result was often little centralized coordination or direction in how agency web sites were created, implemented or maintained.
Similarly, there was no statewide IT authority in New York until 1996 and no official mandate to adopt a particular web-related standard or platform until late in 1999. People who were instrumental in early web development taught themselves the skills necessary and integrated web development responsibilities into their existing duties on an ad hoc basis. These combined duties evolved into "hybrid" positions, more dependent on the individual's skills than the individual's title, organizational placement or training. The results of our survey show this diversity of skills and background still to be the case.
The use of standards in planning and implementation has always been a strong factor in successful application development and deployment. However, because the web geometrically expands the size and diversity of the audience for whom developers must design interfaces, we have found that the effective implementation of certain standards can have a significant impact on how well the needs of a web site's audience are met and what percentage of the audience can effectively use the web site.
Usability and Accessibility
The continuum correlating to an individual's success in finding and navigating a web site, locating information and services, and correctly interpreting web site content is referred to in this report as usability. Jakob Neilsen, a noted web design and usability expert, describes usability this way:
"Usability's job is to research user behavior and find out what works. Usability should also defend users' rights and fight for simplicity."
There are multiple dimensions affecting a site's relative usability:
This last dimension has resulted in the definition of a separate but related term, accessibility. Usability generally encompasses a web site's entire audience; accessibility usually indicates the degree to which a web site's information and/or applications are available for use by a segment of its audience that has one or more disabilities. The web community, to its credit, recognized early that the audience for its web sites included individuals with various disabilities, often using assistive technology. In many instances, because of the impact of their disabilities, these individuals cannot use more traditional means of communication and look to the web as a primary source of information.
The 2000 US Census identified approximately twenty percent (20%) of the population over the age of five as having a disability that precluded them from leaving home or working. These disabilities were long lasting and often impacted their ability for self-care.
This report addresses two different types of standards defined below and the potential that each has to affect the degree of success an individual has in locating information and services on state government web sites. Wherever possible, we will try to be explicit regarding the type of standard we are referring to.
Usability has evolved very quickly into a full-blown discipline within the web design field. A Google search on "usability" will yield over 22 million matches. A Google search on "accessibility" returns approximately 287 million matches. It is safe to assume that these two terms and the body of knowledge that each represents has made its way into the main stream of web development.
One of the primary means for ensuring both usability and accessibility in web development is the adherence of these sites to an evolving set of standards and best practices, among which are the design recommendations that come from the research that Neilsen talks about in his work on usability. This report recognizes both best practices and standards, and the potential that each has to affect the degree of success someone using a public sector web site has in locating information and services.
Best Practices and Standards
As disciplines such as usability mature, they are likely to evolve from best practices in web design into standards. For web development, the de facto standards-setting body is the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C). The W3C is composed of experts from academia, government and industry, who collaborate to develop a common set of standards. These standards are the first type referred to in this report. Site developers must understand and use the same standards that web server and browser developers use to create content; otherwise, there is a high likelihood that the successful delivery of that content will be compromised.
The second type of standard referred to in this report is the title specification (i.e., minimum qualifications, typical duties, etc.) developed by the NYS Department of Civil Service to define minimum requirements and typical duties for a position within New York's merit-based employment system.
At present, there is no single title or group of titles (referred to as a "title series") for which the primary duties relate to web page/site development or management. While some title specifications have been expanded to encompass possible web development duties, there is no requirement for training or certification that a potential web developer could use to identify and attain the necessary skills, and there is no clear career path for those who wish to specialize in web development. Often this situation results in the lack of knowledge about, and failing to apply the latest technologies, resulting in the inadvertent erection of unnecessary barriers that may adversely affect significant percentages of an intended audience.
The Digital Divide
Government agencies have a particular responsibility to ensure that all constituents that they serve have full and equal access to the information that the agency is required to distribute. An agency is not effectively serving the public if a segment of their constituency cannot easily get access to the information that resides on agency web sites. The gap between those individuals able to access this information and those not able to access it is determined by issues such as:
These various obstacles can create what is known as a "digital divide." Accessibility for readers with disabilities is included in digital divide issues, but digital divide issues are much wider than just accessibility.
According to the US Department of Education, forty-eight percent (48%) of the United States population reads at approximately the eighth-grade level (Jakob Neilsen, Alertbox, March 14, 2005: Low Literacy; http://www.useit.com/alertbox/20050314.html). Newspapers recognize this fact and typically aim their content at a sixth-grade reading level. Yet, most government web sites are written at the eleventh- or twelfth-grade level (West, pp. 5-6).
This means we can assume that almost half the population will not be able to fully understand most government web sites. A significant portion of the public is not able to use the services provided on government web sites, while increasingly the web site is the only place these services are provided.
Critical Success Factors
New York State government agencies, like much of the public sector, have recognized the benefits of using web sites to successfully reach the constituencies they regulate or provide services for. This trend is called e-government. The Office for Technology sponsored a major initiative to implement e-government in New York State primarily because of the efficiencies it offered.
Our research indicates that three things need to be done to ensure the success of e-government initiatives in New York State. First, it is necessary to build increased awareness of the issues impeding the development of accessible content on public sector web sites at the managerial level. Second, is to make web designers aware of the critical success factors for usability and accessibility that are now recognized as predictive of successful public sector web sites. Third, web developers must be given structured skill improvement opportunities, linked to overall career development, so they can create standards-compliant, usable and accessible web content and make old web pages accessible.
Current New York State Forum Initiatives
The NYS Forum deals with a wide range of complex policy, research and educational issues. Few, however, have implications for more directly affecting so many of New York's constituents - individuals and businesses alike - as the development of state and local government web sites. This widespread impact and the need to achieve equitable access for all lies at the heart of this publication and the investigation it represents.
Forum Committees Addressing Information Technology Accessibility
The NYS Forum's IT Accessibility Committee and the Webmasters' Guild address accessibility issues within the technology community, encourage the development of sensible policies to address these issues and provide the technical training and support necessary to implement the policies.
Among the innovations recently offered by the IT Accessibility Committee was a day-long seminar on web accessibility conducted at the "Technology Opens Doors Conference," Governor George Pataki's Assistive Technology Expo in May, 2004. To prepare for the session, the committee rapidly developed a repeatable, modular curriculum, parts of which have been offered at the Webmasters' Guild, SUNY's leadership conferences, the annual Government Technology Conference and other venues.
The committee also recently developed and is offering, in partnership with OFT, a series of hands-on clinics that allow participants to bring their own web pages for expert consultation in a classroom setting, and where other participants could benefit from the discussions that ensue. The first such clinic was completely subscribed in 36 hours, demonstrating the pent-up demand for such training.
With the release of NYS Technology Policy P04-002 and NYS Mandatory Technology Standards S04-001 in June, 2004, the IT Accessibility Committee partnered with the Office for Technology to provide advice and support for State agencies working to bring their web sites into compliance. Members of the committee joined OFT staff for meetings with concerned agencies. The committee provides additional support materials in a section of their web site dedicated to the interpretation and implementation of the policy and standards. In July, 2004, OFT presented the new standards at The Forum's Annual Strategic Planning Session. In May, 2005, the committee arranged for OFT to address the Webmasters' Guild to explain the policy and standards, hear feedback from the community working with them on a daily basis and clarify agency questions on implementation. The IT Accessibility Committee has also worked with OFT to ensure that the recent update to the State banner resolves the accessibility issues inherent to the original version of the banner.
This deliberate and productive collaboration has benefited both organizations. OFT has gained access to a community of expert web developers who have successfully implemented accessibility standards and can help by providing support to less experienced web developers. The IT Accessibility Committee maintains a dialog with the policy makers and can use agencies' feedback to OFT in developing programs and resources to assist in the implementation of the policy and standards.
It is worth noting that the two co-chairs of the IT Accessibility Committee, Debi Orton from the Governor's Office of Employee Relations and Mike Short from the Department of Civil Service, were recognized for their contributions and efforts with The Forum by being selected to receive the Award for Excellence in Government Information Services. The Forum's Award for Excellence is given to individuals who have exhibited extraordinary leadership and commitment to work that benefits New York State.
The NYS Forum's Webmasters' Guild was initially formed in 1995 to provide resources to employees of state and local governments whose job is to maintain their agency web sites. The committee is used to share ideas, issues, problems, etc. with other state and local governments. There has historically been a natural synergy between the Webmasters' Guild and accessibility advocates, and the relationship has been strengthened with both groups now under the Forum's umbrella. Indeed, The Forum's IT Accessibility Committee grew from the interests of specific members within the Webmasters' Guild.
The Webmasters' Guild sponsored several very successful day-long accessibility programs in both Albany and New York City. These programs succeeded in identifying the issues around accessibility and significantly raised the awareness level within New York State regarding this issue. The Forum and its committees, with financial assistance from the Governor's Office of Employee Relations and the Public Employees Federation, sponsored a very well attended session by web standards advocate Jeffrey Zeldman, a recognized usability and accessibility expert.
The Forum, and in particular these two committees, have provided most of the generic (i.e., not based on a specific tool) standards-based training and educational opportunities for State web developers over the past several years and that history provided the context for this research initiative.
December Online Survey on Web Development
With the new accessibility policy and mandatory technology standards in place as of June, 2004, the Forum committees felt the next logical step was to find out what training and education may be needed by web development employees and to what extent agencies were complying with the policy standards. The means for securing this information was an online survey requesting demographic information along with web developer input on the topics they felt were important to address. The results of the survey would provide two important outcomes for the committees: more in-depth information on areas of interest to help in developing programs for the coming year, and clarification of the positions and work context of those developing New York State web sites.
This online survey included participation by 226 New York State government employees. Its main purpose was to glean information with which to plan presentations and training opportunities for the coming year. The survey also looked into the status of agency accessibility compliance efforts to determine if agencies are in compliance and if not, what obstacles remained for them.
The survey confirmed many of the prior assumptions regarding the public sector work force that is supporting the New York State e-government effort, and also confirmed the diversity of this particular work force. The 226 participants for the online survey included 92.9 percent State government employees, 4.9 percent public education employees, 1.3 percent from other government entities and 0.9 percent local government employees. The state employee participants represented 13 different state agencies. Of those responding, 60 percent are from the Professional, Scientific, and Technical bargaining unit, represented by the Public Employees Federation, 15 percent are designated Management/Confidential, 7 percent are in the CSEA Administrative Services bargaining unit and 4 percent are from the State University of New York professional services, represented by the United University Professions.
Within the participatory group, 68 percent of respondents had a four-year degree or higher and 19 percent had a two-year degree.
Only approximately two-thirds, 63 percent, of individuals doing web development are located in IT sections of their organizations. The remainder were spread throughout the organization. Seventeen percent were located in a program area, 9 percent were located in the public information office and 9 percent in other areas of agencies.
Adding to the complexity of meeting the survey's stated goals is the fact that each employee fulfills many different roles in the web development continuum. For example, the same person may be involved in web page development, web application development, providing content, managing the web site, acting as graphic designer, carrying out program staff duties, and in some cases, also comprising agency management and agency executive staff.
The survey population also reinforced the diversity of authoring tools in use. The main authoring tools that most participants use are Macromedia's Dreamweaver (38%), Microsoft's FrontPage (18%) and some others: Macromedia ColdFusion (4.4%), Microsoft Visual Studio (4.4%), Macromedia's HomeSite (4%) and GWD Text Editor (2%). In addition to those listed, we know for example, that the Office for Technology supports an IBM Websphere Users' Group that meets in conjunction with the Webmasters' Guild meetings four or five times a year.
Survey Respondents' Concerns
Survey respondents identified several key issues representing barriers they confront while attempting to comply with the state policy and standards. Among those identified were the lack of training to enable them to produce compliant HTML and CSS code, and the perception that even if the training were available, the likelihood that they could attend, because of financial and work load issues, was small.
The online survey showed that the fundamental barriers were:
Survey respondents reported that the highest likelihood that agency employees could attend a training session would be if it were low cost (49.6%) or free (58.4%). The majority of respondents reported that they would only be able to attend training and education if it were local.
The results of the survey spurred the Forum committees to take a deeper look at some of the barriers to compliance with the state standards, narrow down which training opportunities would be the most accessible by and most meaningful to state employees and identify the most effective mechanisms to deliver those trainings, as well as which issues are most prominent in the web developer field.
Short-Term Survey Response
The Forum and its committees had begun to recognize the issues that the survey confirmed. At approximately the same time that the survey was being developed, the Forum reached out to the World Organization of Webmasters (WOW) and began a discussion with the organization around the benefits of establishing a long-term relationship with them. The Forum felt that WOW offered opportunities to address two perceived significant issues impacting web professionals in New York State.
These issues were the lack of accessible training for web professionals and the lack of a clear career path and accepted job title delineation for web professionals. The online survey revealed the fact that there is no standard for organizational placement of web development responsibilities. Additionally, it demonstrated that there are no formal job titles and as a result, no established promotional track for web professionals. The lack of specific job titles in the web profession in State government significantly handicaps agencies as they seek to replace staff that have left the agency or to create additional jobs to meet the expanding requirements related to developing and maintaining an agency's web presence. This lack of recognition of web development as a discipline has also resulted in a lack of uniformity in the implementation of web development tools, resulting in the need for substantial and diverse training requirements.
Our research into WOW showed us that the organization offers three tiers of professional certification for web developers in five different title areas. They also offer a very well- structured training program for web professionals to prepare them to take the certification examinations for these titles
The survey results coincided with the inauguration of the Forum's association with the WOW, and the committees looked to that organization to help meet training needs. Issues relative to training location and cost were addressed by bringing WOW presenters to Albany for two one-day sessions in web site development and web site management, with costs underwritten by the Governor's Office of Employee Relations in partnership with the Public Employees Federation and the Civil Service Employees Association, the two largest public employee unions, representing almost 150,000 State workers.
These inaugural sessions were held during Presidents' Week in February, 2005. This is traditionally a family vacation period, as children are given time off from school. Over 230 attended the first day session, and almost 200 attended the second day session. This turnout was accomplished with less than five weeks' lead time. Forum leadership felt that this enthusiasm not only underscored the need for these types of programs but also underscored the commitment of New York State web professionals to their discipline. The attendees gave the sessions very high marks, and many have asked for additional sessions from WOW in the near future.
Concurrent with the development of this report and an outgrowth of the initial work of The Forum with WOW, GOER is pursuing a substantial training contract to expand the learning opportunities available to New York's web developers.
Since The Forum has partnered with WOW, they have been asked by RTI International, an independent, nonprofit, North Carolina research firm, to join an effort RTI is pursuing with the US Department of Labor to develop an O*Net or Occupational Information Network. This is a comprehensive database of worker attributes and job characteristics that will replace the Dictionary of Occupational Titles (DOT) which has long been the nation's primary source of occupational information. This role for WOW underscores the rationale that led to The Forum/WOW partnership and adds a national dimension to the job classification efforts The Forum hopes to pursue in New York state.
Focus Group Sessions
The rich data results from the web developer survey prompted the committees to refine the findings of the survey through the use of focus groups.
The focus group initiative included a preliminary questionnaire and two focus group sessions to obtain more in-depth information. A total of 17 web developers participated. The participants were all from State agencies with salary grades ranged from SG-15 to M-1. Participants from ten agencies, representing small, medium and large organizations, attended the sessions.
Participants filled out a preliminary questionnaire before attending a group. In addition, participants were provided with copies of the focus group topics before the group sessions convened. The sessions focused on the prominent issues that appeared in the online survey data.
The questionnaire contained ten items seeking key information:
The pre-focus group questionnaire results depicted the wide variety of ancillary tasks web developers perform. Those tasks included: proofread content and assess usability; document the web site; develop (program) web applications; coordinate information architecture; write standards and policies, develop graphic designs; make public affairs decisions; maintain and develop interfaces for online transactions; provide training; act as project manager; maintain proficiency in HTML coding; validate content for accessibility; test, analyze, assess for standards adherence; and manage web-based publications.
In many cases, these roles are performed for both Internet and intranet web sites. There is an extremely broad cross-section of the public that comprises the targeted audiences for the different agencies. Most agencies have to meet the needs of their public audience, as well as an internal audience for their intranet.
Almost all of the participants felt that they helped their agency effectively reach their targeted audiences. All of the agency representatives surveyed expressed support for the State's accessibility policy and standards, and all participants were in the process of implementing the standards on their agencies' web sites.
With information from the preliminary questionnaires in hand, The Forum committees conducted two facilitated group sessions. In each, participants discussed five issues. The issues were posed to participants as questions that dealt with training and education; leadership understanding and support; operational management; resource commitment; and organizational responsibility. The goal was to extract recommendations and next steps from the focused discussion of these topic areas.
In both focus group sessions three themes surfaced frequently:
The first theme was the inability to move fast enough. Managers would constantly respond to web development staff to, "Get this up on the site," and, "Skate as fast as you can." Most participants reported a lack of understanding on the part of managers of what it takes to put something up on the web site, especially if it requires a new technique or skill that needs to be learned. As a result of an overall lack of affordable local training opportunities and a lack of a clear enterprise strategy for web site development, web developers reported they are most often self-taught in the software that will be used at their agency, and in the skills to produce new content types for the site are learned on an as needed basis.
As agencies become more reliant upon their web sites as their primary communication tool with their constituencies, this lack of ready skill development opportunities - in combination with increased competition on the part of agency program staff for scarce web development capacity - is an increasingly important issue. This lack of forward planning is not a new phenomenon in the relationship between IT professionals and the agency staff they serve, but this manifestation of it was identified as a major issue by survey and focus group participants. The issue was exacerbated by the perception among a significant percentage of respondents that there is a clear lack of training, resources and appreciation for web developers within the state system, especially in light of the increasing reliance by state agencies on the web as a communications medium with New York's constituencies.
The second theme was the perceived lack of clear standards and guidelines and the resources and training web developers need in general. Web developers have a wide range of skill levels and, most often, alone choose and master the tools they utilize to get the job done, without clear guidance. One byproduct of this autonomy in tool selection is that in response to demands by their program staffs, some less technically inclined web developers have adopted "wysiwyg" (what you see is what you get) tools, which don't require an in-depth knowledge of the underlying technology. While this enables staff to become quickly productive, it leaves them without the knowledge necessary to remediate their web pages when a validation tool reports accessibility errors.
The third theme was that lack of recognition that web development is a discipline that requires conscious and constant skill improvement to master. Most days it's "just in time" training for a new web application or software system. Web developers report constantly hearing "Figure it out," and have adopted the mind set of "Learn as you go."
These three central themes and the focus group session discussions around them, yielded six major topics of concern. Focus group participant input and observations around those six areas are noted below:
Preparedness/Training
Succession Planning
Separation of Functions
Lack of Uniformity
Need for Knowledge
Organizational Responsibility
Based on the outcome of the survey and focus groups, participants identified the following as some of the best practices of agencies with successful web development organizations:
As a result of analyzing the data collected in the online and pre-focus group surveys and that provided by the focus groups conducted in April, 2005, the following action recommendations are made:
Training and Education:
NOTE: A benefit of working with WOW and GOER is the potential development of a set of competencies and core curriculum that might eventually be used to develop a title series and career path for web developers in New York State. The lack of a title series and a career path for web developers is a concern heard from many of the participants. The New York State Department of Civil Service has been working with agencies to obtain suggestions for what the title series should contain and at this point there is no consensus among agencies because web development is not consistent. At present, there is a focus on the recommendations coming out of the Office of the Chief Information Officer (OCIO) Council's Human Resources (HR) Subcommittee. It would make sense to channel the recommendations and suggestions made here through The Forum's committees to the CIO Council, and this idea was endorsed by the Forum's leadership at the annual planning meeting held in July, 2005.
Operational Management:
Leadership Understanding and Support:
West, Darrell M. "Working Document: Achieving E-Government for All: Highlights from a National Survey" Benton Foundation and The NYS Forum of the Rockefeller Institute of Government. www.benton.org/publibrary/egov/access2003.html
Jakob Nielsen Alertbox, March 14, 2005: Low Literacy Users, http://www.useit.com/alertbox/20050314.html.
Pre-Focus Group Questionnaire
Focus Group Discussion Topics
Press Release
We ask that you complete this survey in hard copy and bring it with you to your interview session.
How effective do you feel your agency's web site is at reaching your targeted audience(s) - e.g., very effective, effective, and fair but could improve, poor, etc.? Please explain.
What are its two weakest points and why?
Has your agency successfully implemented the State's accessibility policy? If not, do you know why? Please explain.
How effective do you think the agency's web site is in providing value to the agency's audience?
INTERVIEW//DISCUSSION QUESTIONS - These are the questions we'll be focusing on in our interview sessions. We've provided them for you in advance so that you would have an opportunity to think about how they could be answered for YOUR situation.
CONTACT:
Rebecca Buchner
New York State Forum
(518) 443-5001
The NYS Forum (The Forum) has been named to the 2005 Associations Advance America Honor Roll, a national awards competition sponsored by the American Society of Association Executives (ASAE), in Washington, D.C.
The Forum received the award for its committee work to develop a training program for making New York State websites accessible and usable by the disabled and then affording that training to over 2000 NY state government web site developers. The recognition also acknowledged the role that The Forum's IT Accessibility Committee had in the shaping the New York state policy and standards for government web site accessibility. The Forum's Committee is co-chaired by Deborah Orton of the NYS Governor's Office of Employee Relations, Mike Short of the NYS Department of Civil Service and Lisa Hebert Ryan of MicroKnowledge, Inc. The Committee includes members from a wide spectrum of New York state government agencies.
Now in its 15th year, the prestigious Associations Advance America Awards program recognizes associations that propel America forward-with innovative projects in educations, skills training, standards setting, business and social innovation, knowledge creation, citizenship and community service.
"The NYS Forum's program truly embodies the spirit of the Associations Advance America campaign. It is an honor and an inspiration to showcase this activity as an example of the many contributions associations are making to advance American society," remarked Associations Advance America Committee Chair David Gabri, President and CEO, Associated Luxury Hotels International.
On behalf of The NYS Forum, it's Executive Director, Gregory Benson, Jr., commented that: "This recognition is an honor for our organization and wonderful acknowledgment of the contributions being made by our committee that has devoted such a superb effort to ensuring that government web sites are usable by all of our state's constituents, particularly those with disabilities."
The NYS Forum is a member organization of information management leaders representing New York state and local government agencies and technology corporations. The Forum's mission is to promote policies and practices for effective development, use and management of information resources in New York State. For further information about The Forum's programs call (518) 443-5001 or email info@nysfirm.org. Visit The NYS Forum online at http://www.nysfirm.org.
August 2005
New York State Forum
The New York State Forum is a network of public officials and State government organizations concerned with information management policy and technology.
Information is a vital resource for New York State. Agencies of State government have widely adopted information technologies to improve their abilities to meet their responsibilities. These technologies, the information they process, and the people who use and manage them are essential components of modern government. Together they support a wide variety of public services, contribute to economic health and development, help to manage the state's physical infrastructure and the natural environment, and foster educational and cultural development. Public managers in New York State have become increasingly aware of a need to articulate information policies and to improve the management of information resources which support state operations. A mechanism is clearly needed to support an ongoing exchange of professional and managerial experiences, to coordinate efforts involving issues that are common or transcend the ability of a single organization, and to facilitate useful sharing of the State's technological, human and information resources.
It is the mission of the New York State Forum to promote policies and practices for effective use and management of information resources in New York State Government.