Free websites for Sonoma County nonprofits

SRJC students build sites for free; gain hands-on experience|

Each spring semester, Santa Rosa Junior College web certificate students build websites for local nonprofits at no expense. Last spring, students built websites for the Petaluma Museum, SOS Counseling and SNAP Cats, a local nonprofit that seeks to house and find homes for cats with special needs.

The services have a market value of $15,000 to $30,000 each. Students get to build their portfolio and client list and gain valuable real-life experience while yielding thousands of dollar worth of value to the community’s nonprofit sector.

The Web and Digital Media Programs at SRJC open a public submission process before the spring term begins. Nonprofit organizations apply for the opportunity to get free student projects built.

The selection process for nonprofits that will receive the free service is based on available students and the alignment of nonprofit client needs with available student team skills.

“Teams develop a project proposal and meet regularly with the clients,” said computer studies faculty member Ethan Wilde. “The nonprofit organizations provide direction and copywriting for site content.”

“Working with our website development team at SRJC was a wonderful experience!” said Darryl Roberts, founder and executive director of SNAP Cats. “They were professional, courteous and extremely innovative in creating the website we envisioned. If they were a local website development company, we’d hire them in a second.”

The Web and Digital Media Projects class that builds the websites, will be offered face-to-face on Santa Rosa campus in Maggini Hall on Thursdays from 5 to 9 p.m. in the Spring 2019 semester.

Interested nonprofits can email the program director directly, Ethan Wilde at ewilde@santarosa.edu.

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