Dynamic Publishing System

The challenge: Keeping up with constant agenda updates

At Region One ESC, workshops, events, and conferences take place throughout the week. As each conference approached, staff regularly updated dates, times, speakers, venues and hotel discounts across conference websites. Initially, each department assigned a lead to update its own Google Site. Because the sites lacked shared branding, colors and information hierarchy, web, and print materials often contained conflicting information.

The Solution: The Agenda-at-a-glance module

To address the problem, I created the Agenda-at-a-Glance module, an all-in-one, tabbed element designed to house the critical information for each conference. The module could be placed on any page and, once implemented, became a familiar feature that users came to expect. Eventually, people began asking, “When will the Agenda-at-a-Glance be ready?”

First Hurdle: Nontechnical Competency

The initial version of the module was static. Although many department web leads were comfortable working with rich media in a content management system, they were not technical staff with experience in web development. That limited adoption, created a queue of review requests, and brought the organization back to the original problem: slow, inconsistent updates.

The Solution: Using Google Sheets

I needed a way for users to update conference information without requiring them to work directly with code. Drawing on a previous Webflow project, I developed a system that used Google Sheets as the data source. The module reads a publicly published Google Sheet in CSV format and uses that information to populate the Agenda-at-a-Glance interface. Department leads can update the sheet without touching the code, while my team retains immediate access to the key information and can make changes quickly when necessary.
The agenda module was added to 30+ conference pages, it took much less time to review as I only needed to inspect a couple of cells. Ultimately dev time was cut to 1/4th of the time it took to copy and past ordered lists and containers.