Cleveland Web Standards Association ‘08 Planning Session
Last night’s CWSA planning meeting was a great success. We’ve had a lot of new faces, some of them traveled pretty far to attend. Some topics discussed last night:
- Trying to advance standards in the local web and business communities without being the CSS gestapo.
- Involving other industries in our group. (Maybe we can find a lawyer to present on the topic of Section 508 compliance or some other aspect of web-related law?)
- Becoming involved with the Email Standards Project.
- Finding a venue for a Cleveland BarCamp.
- Creating our own business case for standards, with examples and success stories from our local community.
- Improving the workflow between front and back end developers.
We had some faculty representatives from a local college show up. They talked about how a group like CWSA benefits them, because it can help their students understand things like being required to validate all assignments.
What I’ve begun to notice is smaller schools and community colleges are really pushing to embrace standards, and at a significantly faster pace than large universities. I don’t know if it’s because of their size they’re able to adapt quicker to industry changes and adopt best practices? Or maybe their high ratio of part-time instructors tend to attract a more passionate faculty, who work in the industry now, not 10 years ago before they became a teacher? It’s my sincere hope that this group can help our local higher learning institutions, community colleges and universities, move forward.
Lastly, I’m trying to plan a purely social event for us next month. I’m hoping to make it coincide with the Cleveland Film Festival, so if there are any fellow geeks in from out of town they can meet us.
I was pleased with the meeting as well. I always look forward to this group getting together. It’s a nice blend of passionate people who would like to see Cleveland thrive.
Looking forward to your social event, too!