This post is from from my other blog here

OK, time for a little Government/Web 2.0 challenge. If you don't know what that means, it's basically an Internet-age term for the easier-than-ever ways in which the general public can individually interact with their government (or businesses) using all manner of free feedback and collaboration tools. Here's an example from your Federal Government.

Do a Google search on "Loudoun School Blogs". At this second (since the search engine result pages, or "SERPS", change constantly), here's what you get on the first and second result pages:

1 - Loudoun Schools Feedback - that's us!
2 - Gateway to Loudoun County - prominent and popular Loudoun County blog
3 - Loudoun School Blogs - LoudounPedia - roundup of blogs in a great local Wiki
4 - Blogs Loudoun Times - the only local newspaper with local bloggers
5 - Our Loudoun Schools Loudoun Times - John Steven's reprints in the Times
6 - Our Loudoun Schools - John Stevens (School Board, Potomac District)
7 - Linked Up in Loudoun | LoudounExtra.com - daily review of Loudoun Blogs
8 - Loudoun School Talk Site Launched - Living in LoCo - news item about us
9 - Living in LoCo | LoudounExtra.com | The Washington Post - local blog about Loudoun
10 - Loudoun School System Recognized...Dec 24, 2006 ... old news item from the Post
11 - Loudoun Schools Dais - Tom Reed's blog (School Board - at large)
12 - Loudoun Democrats - blog news item
13 - washingtonpost.com- May 8, 2007 - news item
14 - Our Loudoun Schools - another John Stevens entry
15 - Mommy Life - local blogger with very religious, family-oriented themes
16 - LoudounExtra.com - local blog listing (pointing to us and John Stevens)
17 - Tango is Available to Parents - Loudoun Times - news item
18 - www.citizenet.com - aggregator of blog items
19 - Loudoun Travelers - seeking those looking for school break travel packages
20 - Loudoun Blogs/Wikis - LoudounPedia - local blog roundup

For a business (i.e. the LCPS) prepared to spend nearly a Billion dollars in taxpayer funds, approximately 85% of the budget of one of the "wealthiest per capita" counties in the country, that's all the public, online discussion you get.

You get our little blog, 1 regular and 1 intermittent school board members' blogs, 2 newspapers, 1 newspaper blog, ...and that's basically it.

Where's everybody else?

We know full well that emails are the preferred medium for parent-to-parent-teachers-to-administrators communications, using computers....but it's time to leverage the rest of the web. That's what we're teaching our children to do, in school, by the way. There do exist a smattering of online conversations about the schools elsewhere, like in local HOA discussion groups, homeschooling support sites, professional sites like Teachers.net, and high school Facebook groups; but it's simply appalling that more adults aren't involved online in the discussion.

Here's the challenge - start a blog, wiki, threaded discussion group, portal, website - any kind of online forum/mechanism for public comment on local, Loudoun education and school topics (private, public or otherwise). Regularly update and promote it, so that it gets to page 1 or 2 in the Google SERPs.

Who'll be first on the board? What group or area of the county, or school district, has the most Internet-savvy and Web 2.0/Government 2.0 engaged parents? Can more teachers and adminstrators learn to blog, or at least figure out ways to blog anonymously en masse?

Right now - here's the grades, in terms of "Taxpayer, Administration and Parental support for Loudoun County students, as Demonstrated by Degree of Government/Web 2.0 Online Engagement (not including email)" -

(Ordered by Google Rank, then graded by the criteria above)

1) "Dulles South District Area" - ( Grade=B ) - we obviously are in the Google lead (and will likely always be, with our secret sauce), but traffic isn't as high as it should be, and our District School Board rep isn't online (only via email)

2) "Potomac District" - ( B+ ) - John Stevens is fabulous online, and has a bit of an edge from the number of comments perspective (but still, a shockingly low number)

3) "Journalists" (WAPO - LoudounExtra) - (B-) - while Loudoun-centric educational material is usually pretty good (it's a Multi-Million dollar business, after all, with professional reporters), it's not as active from a feedback/comment perspective as it should be, and tends to focus more on "objective news" vs. "subjective and objective issues and ideas" we all need to talk about.

4) "At Large School Board Members" - (C+) - while an admirable start last year, there's only been 5 entries from Tom Reed since last Summer, and few comments.

5) "Politicos" - (Too Conservative) - (C) - definitely gets good traffic and comments from the local political club, but school topics are sparse and typically relegated to budget/election issues.

6) "Christian Moms" - (Mommy Life) - Loudoun-based, and sometimes Loudoun-focused with respect to special needs in the schools

7) "Government-Watchers" - (The Municipalist) - (C) - Loudoun-based, but not Loudoun-focused - still manages to get in very worthwhile commentary about Loudoun Schools once in a while.

8) "Teachers" - (Teachers.net, Virginia forum) - (B) - some pretty good mix of parent/teacher discussion, though only tends to flare up once in a while...not promoted much, as well, nor is entirely Loudoun-centric.

Get going - if you need help with how to go about online blogging and such, drop us a line...