Working together for standards The Web Standards Project


Buzz Archives: Education

Web Design Course Materials Licensed to W3C

As professional web builders we know that the web is constantly changing and our methods and practices must respond and adapt as well. There are so many new disciplines web professionals need to be know about, if not specizlized in, that weren’t around ten or even five years ago. It’s ...

By Christopher Schmitt | February 8th, 2012

HTML5 logo: be proud, but don’t muddy the waters!

In which we ask that the W3C to come up with a new monicker for the umbrella of modern web technologies.

By Chris Mills | January 18th, 2011

Small Business Update

A while back I announced WaSP’s new small business outreach effort and, thanks to your help, we’ve been making great progress.

By Aaron Gustafson | August 5th, 2010

InterACT With Web Standards Book Released

You may have noticed that the InterACT curriculum team recently released its first book: InterACT With Web Standards: A Holistic Approach to Web Design. It is the first book released by WaSP, and it directly ties into the work that the Education Task Force and other contributors have put into the courses in the InterACT curriculum.

By Chris Casciano | June 9th, 2010

Six New Courses Added to the InterACT Curriculum

Today, six more essential courses join the WaSP InterACT curriculum to help schools prepare their students for a career working on the Web.

By Aarron Walter | March 17th, 2010

A New Direction and a New Project

In an effort to increase adoption of web standards, we’re going to try something new.

By Aaron Gustafson | February 2nd, 2010

The Dawn of the Education Era

We are proud to announce the WaSP InterAct Curriculum.

By Derek Featherstone | March 16th, 2009

Shared Passion

Something magical happens when you put a group of people that have a shared passion in the same room together. We're not just talking "excitement" here, either. We're talking passion -- the kind that keeps the fire in the belly burning; the kind that brings people together from far away ...

By Derek Featherstone | February 15th, 2009

Call-to-action: Save the UT Accessibility Institute

The University of Texas is closing its Accessibility Institute today. Non-profit Knowbility has started a petition to save it. Though you may not have heard of the Accessibility Institute, you have been influenced by its work. Its late founder, Dr. John Slatin, was the former co-chair of the Web Content Accessibility ...

By James Craig | August 29th, 2008

Announcing the WaSP Curriculum Framework

Since March 2008, the WaSP Education Task Force has begun working on the WaSP Curriculum Framework, a collection of tools aiming to identify skill sets and competencies that aspiring Web professionals need to acquire to prepare them for their chosen careers, as well as resources that will help both educators and students.

By Steph Troeth | July 31st, 2008

Curriculum Survey Results

The Web Standards Project Education Task Force release the results of the 2007 Curriculum Survey.

By Rob Dickerson | July 28th, 2008

Opera Web Standards Curriculum

Chris Mills of Opera Software ASA announced today the release of the Opera Web Standards Curriculum. The initial 23 of 50 proposed articles are published and available.

By Rob Dickerson | July 8th, 2008

EduTF Report Highlights Curriculum Project

The WaSP Education Task Force (EduTF) report updates our activity, announces new members, and offers a report on a Web standards based Curriculum Project.

By Holly Marie Koltz | May 16th, 2008

W3C Offers Online Training Course: Mobile Best Practices

The W3C Mobile Web Initiative is offering the online training course: An Introduction to W3C’s Mobile Web Best Practices from May 26 – June 20, 2008. The course is free, registration is open, but limited.

By Holly Marie Koltz | May 4th, 2008

Showing Off My <body> and Loving It

I’m so tired of people half-assing it on Casual Day, but Naked Day? Now you have my full attention

By Christopher Schmitt | April 7th, 2008

Education Task Force Curriculum Survey

The Web Standards Project Education Task Force has created a curriculum survey and seeks input from educational professionals.

By Rob Dickerson | June 13th, 2007

The Web Standards Documentary Project

Aarron Walter, a faculty member of The Art Institute of Atlanta, launches The Web Standards Documentary Project.

By Rob Dickerson | April 20th, 2007

Spring Fling

April 5, 2007 sees the Highland Fling in Edinburgh, Scotland – a one-day conference aimed at web developers and businesses with an interest in web standards and accessibility.

By Derek Featherstone | March 27th, 2007

Advocacy in Education

Hailing from Sweden, Lars Gunther, (relatively unknown to the Web guru world), takes on a sizable challenge and project to educate and advocate Web standards and curriculum change in his country’s educational system.

By Rob Dickerson | September 26th, 2006

Accessibility Webcast on Plone

Many developers in the education field are moving to open source content management software solutions for a variety of reasons, including: better standards/accessibility support, and a growing community and network of resources and help. The National Center on Disability & Access to Education recently hosted a webcast case study of one such solution, Plone.

By Holly Marie Koltz | September 2nd, 2006

Back to School, Back to Reality

As a student of Interactive Media Design at the Art Institute of Dallas, Texas, Blake Elshire learned CSS as part of his course, then discovered that not all students were quite as charmed by the technology as he was. He shares his thoughts and insights with WaSP EduTF.

By Rob Dickerson | August 28th, 2006

New book: Web Accessibility – Web Standards and Regulatory Compliance

Those who remember the (now defunct) seminal Glasshaus book Accessible Web Sites may be interested to know that friends of ED have just released a completely reworked and expanded successor: Web Accessibility - Web Standards and Regulatory Compliance.After an overview of the accessibility law and guidelines, and a discussion about ...

By Patrick Lauke | August 20th, 2006

Flash, JavaScript, UX, standards, apologia, apologies, and one man’s opinions

The recent discussion of plug-in implementation, here and elsewhere, points to broader issues that affect everyone who is invested in web standards adoption.

By Ben Henick | August 18th, 2006

On Quality Education

“What college or university has a good program for Web Development (or Design)?” is a question frequently encountered on mailing lists, in forums, or in conversations with others. Many would like to know the answer.

By Holly Marie Koltz | May 24th, 2006

Educating Web Professionals

José Trudel instructs students with a focus on emerging technologies, standards, and skills; providing a strong foundation needed for today’s web professional.

By Rob Dickerson | May 22nd, 2006

Notre Dame Web Group

Lead Web developer Steve Smith and the University of Notre Dame Web Group tackle web standards and accessibility in original and exciting ways.

By Holly Marie Koltz | April 12th, 2006

Accessibility First – A Novel Teaching Method

Educator Brian Rosmaita proposes an ‘accessibility first’ approach for teaching web design.

By Ian Lloyd | March 20th, 2006

Queen's New Clothes

WaSP eduTF interviews Tim Hannigan on Queen’s University’s conversion to Web standards.

By Steph Troeth | March 13th, 2006

Kudos to Michigan State

Michigan State University launched a redesign of its Web site, yesterday. Designed and developed with best practices that follow Web Standards and Web Accessibiity, the university Web site looks good and validates to the XHTML strict doctype. The redesign involved the teamwork of the MSU Libraries, Computing, and ...

By Holly Marie Koltz | February 28th, 2006

Web Standards in Small Organisations

I don’t really make resolutions at new year, but perhaps if I did it should be this. To be more actively involved in the organisations I care about in making sure that they get solid advice about the web. Most of us likely have some kind of contact with a small ...

By Drew McLellan | January 30th, 2006

Pandora’s Box (Model) of CSS Hacks And Other Good Intentions

This Thanksgiving I’ve decided it’s about time that I provided some more background and analysis on one of the things I am certainly unintentionally (in)famous for.

By Tantek Çelik | November 27th, 2005

The Web Standards Project is a grassroots coalition fighting for standards which ensure simple, affordable access to web technologies for all.

Recent Buzz

Our Work Here is Done

By Aaron Gustafson | March 1st, 2013

Thanks to the hard work of countless WaSP members and supporters (like you), Tim Berners-Lee’s vision of the web as an open, accessible, and universal community is largely the reality.

When The Web Standards Project (WaSP) formed in 1998, the web was the battleground in an ever-escalating war between two browser makers—Netscape and Microsoft—who were each taking turns “advancing” HTML to the point of collapse. You see, in an effort to one-up each other, the two browsers introduced new elements and new ways of manipulating web documents; this escalated to the point where their respective 4.0 versions were largely incompatible.

Realizing that this fragmentation would inevitably drive up the cost of building websites and ran the risk of denying users access to content and services they needed, Glenn Davis, George Olsen, and Jeffrey Zeldman co-founded WaSP and rallied an amazing group of web designers and developers to help them push back. The WaSP’s primary goal was getting browser makers to support the standards set forth by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C).

In 2001, with the browser wars largely over, WaSP began to shift its focus. While some members continued to work with browser vendors on improving their standards support, others began working closely with software makers like Macromedia to improve the quality of code being authored in tools such as Dreamweaver. And others began the hard slog of educating web designers and developers about the importance of using web standards, culminating in the creation of WaSP InterAct, a web curriculum framework which is now overseen by the W3C.

Thanks to the hard work of countless WaSP members and supporters (like you), Tim Berners-Lee’s vision of the web as an open, accessible, and universal community is largely the reality. While there is still work to be done, the sting of the WaSP is no longer necessary. And so it is time for us to close down The Web Standards Project.

Many (if not all) of us are continuing to work in the world of web standards, but our work is now largely outside the umbrella of WaSP. If you are interested in continuing to work on web standards-related projects along with us, we humbly suggest you follow these projects:

  • A List Apart – The magazine “for people who make websites” is run by WaSP founder Jeffrey Zeldman and is a consistent source of forward-thinking articles and tutorials.
  • HTML5 Doctor – A solid resource and discussion forum on all things HTML5, brought to you by Bruce Lawson and his team.
  • W3C Community Groups – If you have a passion for a specific web technology, you can help make it better by participating in one (or more) community groups. In particular, you might be interested in one of these: Core Mobile Web Platform, Responsive Images, Web Education, and Web Media Text Tracks.
  • WebPlatform.org – A fantastic web standards resource, providing up-to-date documentation, Q&As, tutorials & more. Chris Mills, Doug Schepers, and a number of other standards advocates are involved in this project.
  • Web Standards Sherpa – An educational resource founded by WaSP which continues to operate under the leadership of Chris Casciano, Virginia DeBolt, Aaron Gustafson, and Emily Lewis.
  • Web Standards + Small Business – An outreach project started by WaSP that educates small businesses about why they should care about web standards. This project is overseen by Aaron Gustafson.

The job’s not over, but instead of being the work of a small activist group, it’s a job for tens of thousands of developers who care about ensuring that the web remains a free, open, interoperable, and accessible competitor to native apps and closed eco-systems. It’s your job now, and we look forward to working with you, and wish you much success.

Nota bene: In the near future, we will be making a permanent, static archive of webstandards.org and some of our other resources like WaSP Interact to preserve them as a resource and to provide a record of our 15-year mission to improve the web.
Bruce Lawson and Steph Troeth contributed to this post.

Filed in WaSP Announcement | Comments (89)

More Buzz articles

Title Author
Call for action on Vendor Prefixes Rachel Andrew
An End to Aging IE Installs Aaron Gustafson
Beyond the Blue Beanie? Stephanie (Sullivan) Rewis
The Sherpas are Here Aaron Gustafson

All of the entries posted in WaSP Buzz express the opinions of their individual authors. They do not necessarily reflect the plans or positions of the Web Standards Project as a group.

This site is valid XHTML 1.0 Strict, CSS | Get Buzz via RSS or Atom | Colophon | Legal