Dear friends, members and artists,
Welcome to our new website! For a long time now we’ve been limited by the functions of our old site and increasingly felt it no longer reflected us as an organisation. Alongside that, it had become cumbersome to use for both teachers and our staff. We knew something had to be done to find a solution to bring us right up to date, in terms of our web presence and the way people use the site.
You see, we’re quite unique and our needs are very different to any organisation out there. We have four (and counting!) different types of events, we have members that are schools, we have individuals who are members, we have a whole family of artists, we have multiple booking forms and registration forms, and we put on more than 60 events each year for over 4,000 students. Managing all of this in a way that looks beautiful while at the same time is easy, simple and intuitive to use has been a tough nut to crack.
What you see is the culmination of hundreds of hours of hard work and is just the start as we begin the next phase of our journey. Please have a look around. The real fun will start when you book and register for events.
Some of the new features include:
– A streamlined booking process for teachers including being able to manage all bookings and registrations from your account.
– A complete refresh of our event pages and our forms.
– A simpler process to apply for membership.
– A new section we’ve called ‘Your ISTA’ with separate pages built with our core audiences in mind; teachers, students, schools, parents and artists.
– A global map where you can see every event taking place.
– A new blog to give us a platform to share our wonderful stories.
And we have more in the pipeline. Coming soon there will be profile pages for every ISTA artist, a brand new Green Room which is being re-named Inside ISTA and a special Digital Scene micro-site which will be for members only.
Every member will very soon be receiving a ‘welcome’ email from us, which will include instructions of how to set your password and login to your account to manage your bookings. With any venture like this there may be some teething problems but please bear with us as we make the transition and rest assured we’re striving to make your lives as easy as possible while at the same time celebrating our incredible organisation.
As I mentioned earlier, this is just the start and will be our springboard to raising the bar in what can be achieved when we bring the worlds of theatre and education together. We’re profoundly grateful for your support and to have you along for the ride.
Thank you for your time and we, of course, welcome any feedback you have.
Sally x