Mount Lawley Primary School - Website Review

Sep 12, 2026

Upload by Paura

Website review for Mount Lawley Primary School focused on mobile usability and search visibility. The review explains how parents evaluate schools and highlights mobile-first expectations driven by Google’s mobile-friendliness ranking signal. It identifies key usability problems: inconsistent content across devices, non-readable sections on mobile, and heavy reliance on PDF documents that limit access. It also notes that the homepage centers only on news. Proposed improvements include a WordPress-based responsive redesign to increase engagement, communication, and school promotion.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryPresentations

FormatPDF

Pages13

Reading Time5 min

AccessFree to download

Introduction

Mobile-first context and parent research behavior

Usability Issues

Different content across devices

Non-readable content on mobile

Reliance on PDF documents

Homepage limited to news

Opportunities

Increase engagement

Better communication

School promotion

Proposed Solution

WordPress-based responsive website

What is responsive web design?

What is WordPress?

Website review Mount Lawley Primary School Generated on 17/04/2017 [nextlearning.com.au](nextlearning.com.au) Next Learning, Ground Floor Rear, 45 St Georges Terrace Perth, WA, 6000 AUSTRALIA Introduction Today, parents check out school options in much the same way as they would if they were buying a car or house. For example, they: • talk to family and friends • call the school and make a time to meet with the principal • look at school websites • collect written materials like brochures from schools • go to information sessions or open days As of 2015, 74% of Australians rely on their phones at least as much as they rely on their desktop, when searching for information, ideas, or advice. For parents researching for the next school for their children, ﬁrst impression is crucial. Moreover, as of April 2015 Google started using mobile-friendliness as a ranking signal: this means that non mobile-friendly sites are now less likely to rank well on Google searches. If your schools' website is not mobile friendly, you are missing out. While the website is technically responsive, there are several issues that affect its usability.(Results from Google mobile-friendly test) Usability Issues Different content on different devices While the difference in layout between the desktop and the mobile version are part of the responsiveness of a website, your site doesn’t necessarily show the same content on different devices. For instance, the Policies page contains at least 14 live links to documents, of which only 2 are accessible from mobile. Usability Issues Content is non-readable On same page, for instance IPS Update and School Council, the content is not displayed properly on mobile, making virtually impossible to read (see screenshot) . Usability Issues Website content relies heavily on PDF documents Many pages on the website link to a PDF documents. While this may be necessary in some instances as documents need to be downloaded, the usability from mobile device is far from ideal (example: the School Handbook) . Ideally, these pages should display the PDF’s content as responsive content (for mobile usability) while offering a download option (for desktop) . PDFs with a large amount of text can be displayed with a menu on top of the page that link to that speciﬁc section (similarly to Wikipedia pages) . Usability Issues Homepage contains only news While it’s important to communicate with the school’s stakeholders, a website’s homepage usually is the ﬁrst point of contact and, as such, should present the school and help users to navigate the website. This would be also beneﬁcial in terms of attracting new students. The news can be hosted on a dedicated section of the website, easy to ﬁnd from both the homepage and the menu. Opportunities A better organised website could offer tangible, long term beneﬁts to your school by helping to build a community around the school. Increase Engagement Teachers and students are proud to showcase their work and achievements. Parents are happy to check on the activities of their children. Better Communication A website is the interface for the school’s community and a medium that facilitates the integration of all the activities inside and outside its walls. School Promotion New parents can experience ﬁrst hand the unique digital ecosystem created within your school. This will contribute to attract new students. Google Confidential and Proprietary Proposed solution A WordPress based responsive website Proposed solution What is responsive web design? Responsive web design is an approach to web design aimed at allowing desktop webpages to be viewed in response to the size of the device one is viewing with. Websites that are designed in a responsive way are also called “mobile friendly”. What is WordPress? WordPress is an online, open source website creation tool. It’s probably the easiest, most powerful and most versatile

FAQs

Why is mobile friendliness important for the school website?

A large share of parents rely on phones to search for information, and Google uses mobile-friendliness as a ranking signal. Non-mobile-friendly sites are less likely to rank well.

What are the main usability problems found on mobile?

The review highlights content differences between desktop and mobile devices, sections that are not displayed properly and become unreadable, and a strong dependence on PDF documents that are inconvenient to use on phones.

What solution is proposed to address these issues?

The proposed solution is a WordPress-based responsive website that improves mobile usability and allows easier staff updates and integrations for communication.

Sep 12, 2026

Upload by Paura