The website competition for school classes is starting for the sixth time today. SWITCH is looking for school classes from all over Switzerland and the Principality of Liechtenstein who would like to explore the possibilities of the World Wide Web and design a website of their own, together with their teachers.
The success story of the Junior Web Award began in 2007 when SWITCH launched the competition on the occasion of its 20-year anniversary. The aim was to promote the Internet and media competence of the young generation. More than 1800 school classes have since entered for the competition. Last year, the competition set a new record again with 192 completed projects, around 40 projects more than the previous year.
School children design their own website
The school classes participating in the competition can design and publish a website of their own free of charge and without any programming knowledge. In so doing, they practice working with state-of-the-art communication technologies, adopting a playful approach. Whether humorous, with a learning effect or highly personal – the school classes jointly decide on the theme they are to adopt for their website and how they will implement it in the Internet. As a Swiss Internet pioneer, SWITCH is setting out to promote know-how about the World Wide Web and familiarity with this medium amongst young people. Tomorrow's generation should be given the opportunity to work with modern technologies. All school classes in Switzerland and the Principality of Liechtenstein at primary school, lower secondary school and upper secondary school level are eligible to enter for the award as of now.
Easy participation – exciting projects
Once they have registered under www.juniorwebaward.ch, SWITCH accompanies the participating school classes and their teachers with information material and provides a CMS program suitable for children which can be used to design the website. The classes can familiarise themselves with the topic of the web and then compile a website on a subject of their choice, working by themselves. The submission deadline for the projects is 15 March 2012. This is followed by a public voting session and the assessment of the websites by a professional jury. Awards are made to the best three projects in each of the three age categories of primary school, lower secondary school and upper secondary school. The winning classes will be honoured at a prize-giving ceremony at the end of May 2012.
About SWITCH
As a non-profit organisation, SWITCH has been guaranteeing Switzerland’s access to the Internet for more than 20 years. Ninety-five employees work on a daily basis on further developing Internet technology, facilitating the exchange of knowledge for Swiss universities and increasing the security of the Internet in Switzerland. In 2012, the Internet service provider with its head office in Zurich will be celebrating its 25th anniversary.  The SWITCH Junior Web Award, the website competition for school classes, has proved particularly popular in all four of Switzerland's language regions. Last year, 192 school classes from the different areas entered their web project for the Award. Today, the competition is being launched for the sixth time. It is open to school classes who would like to design their own website as part of a project. They can register at www.juniorwebaward.ch. More information, including on the winning projects for 2011, may also be found on the Junior Web Award website. |
