Does your MT program have a website?

[Herb]

If so, let me know. I'm slowly but surely working to get www.olemissmocktrial.org up and running, and one of the things I'd like to add is a page with links to other MT program's sites, on the off chance that someone who isn't in our program actually wants to look at our page. So if you'd like to be added to the eventual "links" page, post here or send me a PM.

Also, while I'm at it, I was curious to what extent other programs use their website. Currently, ours can do the following:

• [li]
  Prospective Members can submit a form with all their information, which is sent out to the coaches and stored in a database online, where we can retrieve it at any time.[/li]
  [li]We can post tryout times on the website and students who are trying out can sign up for their time via the website.[/li]
  [li]Each team can upload their directs/crosses to their own special page on the server, coaches can view all team folders and upload them.[/li]
  [li]We do have forums up, but they don't get used much[/li]

But aside from tryouts we haven't always gotten a whole lot of use out of it because last year it was a lot more difficult to upload files. As far as thread discussion goes... does anyone else use their website for day to day operations, or do you just use it for informational purposes? What would you LIKE to be able to do with a MT website? I've always thought it was a great way to centralize information and resources, but that's always contingent upon everyone using it.

[SamIam]

UVa's website (www.uvamocktrial.org) has many of the features you mentioned, such as a contact form for prospective members and an intranet that allows members to log in and upload their files. The intranet saves and archives all versions of every direct, cross, and speech, so you can always go back to the old versions later if the new changes don't work out. There is also a miscellaneous section for things like case materials, excusal letters for class absences, and instructional PowerPoint presentations about the law and rules of evidence. This year UVa uploaded 824 files over the course of the season.

Files can be accessed by all team members and coaches, and there is also an option when uploading files to send a notification e-mail to the relevant personnel about the changes. The intranet also has a quoteboard where members can post quotes and memories from the season, a team directory, and birthday reminders (for example, it informs me that 972 attorney Ryann Burke turns 20 in 3 days!) Completely gratuitously, it also featured count-down timers, accurate to the second, of the time remaining until regionals and then nationals.

For administrators, the intranet has standard forms that allow us to easily update news articles and photo and video galleries. It also has an e-mail manager that allows us to e-mail our lists of D.C. attorneys to recruit judges for GAMTI and regionals, and the GAMTI/Regionals judges page (http://www.uvamocktrial.org/gamti/regionals.php) has a form where prospective judges can input their information, which is automatically dumped into another handy feature, the judges database. The judges database and e-mail manager are integrated such that we can e-mail all current and former judges at the click of a button. I can't begin to explain how much simpler and stress-free this has made tournament planning.

In answer to your question, UVa definitely uses the website for day-to-day operations. Most members probably log on at least once, and usually multiple times, daily throughout the year. It's been hugely helpful from a logistical standpoint, and features like the quoteboard are also just a lot of fun. Thinking back on it, I'm not really sure how we ever functioned without the intranet.

Finally, I should note that the credit for the website and the intranet belongs entirely to Daniel Young and Benjamin Sachs - I'm really not sure what we would have done without either of them, either.

[Herb]

[quote author=SamIam link=topic=3465.msg157135#msg157135 date=1177516814]
UVa's website (www.uvamocktrial.org) has many of the features you mentioned, such as a contact form for prospective members and an intranet that allows members to log in and upload their files. The intranet saves and archives all versions of every direct, cross, and speech, so you can always go back to the old versions later if the new changes don't work out. There is also a miscellaneous section for things like case materials, excusal letters for class absences, and instructional PowerPoint presentations about the law and rules of evidence. This year UVa uploaded 824 files over the course of the season.

Files can be accessed by all team members and coaches, and there is also an option when uploading files to send a notification e-mail to the relevant personnel about the changes. The intranet also has a quoteboard where members can post quotes and memories from the season, a team directory, and birthday reminders (for example, it informs me that 972 attorney Ryann Burke turns 20 in 3 days!) Completely gratuitously, it also featured count-down timers, accurate to the second, of the time remaining until regionals and then nationals.

For administrators, the intranet has standard forms that allow us to easily update news articles and photo and video galleries. It also has an e-mail manager that allows us to e-mail our lists of D.C. attorneys to recruit judges for GAMTI and regionals, and the GAMTI/Regionals judges page (http://www.uvamocktrial.org/gamti/regionals.php) has a form where prospective judges can input their information, which is automatically dumped into another handy feature, the judges database. The judges database and e-mail manager are integrated such that we can e-mail all current and former judges at the click of a button. I can't begin to explain how much simpler and stress-free this has made tournament planning.

In answer to your question, UVa definitely uses the website for day-to-day operations. Most members probably log on at least once, and usually multiple times, daily throughout the year. It's been hugely helpful from a logistical standpoint, and features like the quoteboard are also just a lot of fun. Thinking back on it, I'm not really sure how we ever functioned without the intranet.

Finally, I should note that the credit for the website and the intranet belongs entirely to Daniel Young and Benjamin Sachs - I'm really not sure what we would have done without either of them, either.
[/quote]

I take it your website is custom coded, instead of running off of a PHP based content management system like Drupal, Plone, Joomla, Wordpress, or something similar?

[SamIam]

I take it your website is custom coded, instead of running off of a PHP based content management system like Drupal, Plone, Joomla, Wordpress, or something similar?

I have no clue - I'd have to ask Ben or Yang. My major accomplishment with respect to the intranet has consisted of not breaking it - I'm fairly illiterate when it comes to this stuff, and technology and I sometimes don't get along ...

[MT4e]

Cornell's website is cornellmocktrial.org...we basically use it to post any recent news or upcoming events and not really as a day to day thing.

[MT4e]

Bellarmine's mock website is www.bellarminemocktrial.com.

[Rain King]

notre dame is www.nd.edu/~mt

im not really sure the last time it's been updated.

[Connor McLeod]

www.marylandmocktrial.com

It was just created and is quite simple. We expect to add more by start of next season.

We use the site mainly for informational purposes, recruitment, etc.

[Krafty]

University of Arizona's site is: www.arizonamocktrial.org

I currently have a "current members" section where I upload important documents, directs, crosses, lessons, etc. I have found that this feature is not used frequently.

Our most used feature is the Team Score Template found on our front page right under the "Welcome" text. Thanks goes to JayZ for design of the template.


I plan on redesigning the page this summer and possibly adding a video to help get some interest in the club from potential new members.

[bluedevilsadvocate]

Duke Mock Trial has a snazzy new website: duke.edu/web/dukemocktrial

Major props to the new exec board there, and Michael D'Ippolito in particular

[Blackbird]

Tufts Mock Trial, at tuftsmocktrial.org was just put up a couple months ago and is still being built (hence, our sweet logo isn't up yet).

[DWdidit]

That's the summer project of one of our officers.... I can't wait to see what she comes up with. Similar to the OP, we're considering doing links to other teams websites.... If you're interested, send me a PM with your team's address.

[Madboy121]

[quote author=bluedevilsadvocate link=topic=3465.msg177053#msg177053 date=1244492430]
Duke Mock Trial has a snazzy new website: http://duke.edu/web/dukemocktrial

Major props to the new exec board there, and Michael D'Ippolito in particular
[/quote]

Thanks for the shoutout, Chetan. I shall give you this lovely graphic for it: ajamas:

[bluedevilsadvocate]

[quote author=Madboy121 link=topic=3465.msg177060#msg177060 date=1244517713]
Thanks for the shoutout, Chetan. I shall give you this lovely graphic for it: ajamas:

[/quote]

You have three posts Madboy? I can only hope the other two were after the season, otherwise you violated my unofficial and hypocritical ban on perjuries posts from Duke MT members.

I shall take the banana graphic as atonement.

[Toby]

UVA website is now at:

http://www.virginiamocktrial.org

[KShaw]

CU mock trial is at http://www.colorado.edu/studentgroups/cumocktrial.

We keep it very simple, more fun than professional (much like CU mock trial itself), and purely informational. There are no submissions, no forms, no uploads, no forums. It gets updated with tournament results, membership information, and meeting times.

I have no idea how often it actually gets used. This next season will be the first time we've had a functional website, so we'll see if it gets us any new recruits. That, I think, will be its biggest impact on our program.

[B Money]

The University of Georgia's Mock Trial website is www.ugamocktrial.org.

[tn.larson]

Hate to revive an older thread, but for the life of me I can't get this registered with the major search engines...

http://students.washington.edu/uwmt/index.html

[Madboy121]

[quote author=tn.larson link=topic=3465.msg185034#msg185034 date=1268085284]
Hate to revive an older thread, but for the life of me I can't get this registered with the major search engines...

http://students.washington.edu/uwmt/index.html
[/quote]

Have you sent your sitemap to Google? Here's a quick guide to getting your site recognized by the major search engines that I used for the Duke Mock Trial site: http://www.google.com/support/webmas...amp;topic=8465. It takes some time for Google to "crawl" onto new sites, but those steps will lead you in the right direction.

[Spitfire]

We use a website for our team but it is purely on the intranet. We use it for schedules, uploads of crosses, directs, objection cheat sheets, etc. We also have links to trial advocacy books, sites like perjuries and occasionally announcements get posted there. In the beginning of the year it is used heavily but as the season passes we tend to just use it for reference. I think making a website is a great idea for every team- its a great tool to have. This is the first year in a long time we have had an operational site but it seems to be a good tool to direct new members too as they struggle to learn the ins and outs of the team.