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"WP-ORG
is an Internet community of 27,000 West Point graduates, parents
of cadets and midshipmen, and friends of West Point and Annapolis.
WP-ORG provides valuable information and communication resources
to this community--free of charge--through scores of websites
and listservices in support of most USMA
classes, West
Point Societies, and West
Point Parent Clubs. Two of the more active listservices WP-ORG supports
include WP-Forum, a moderated list open to USMA grads of any
year group and rank; and Parent Forum, a moderated list for USMA
parents to learn about West Point and exchange information and
questions with other parents. WP-ORG is also host to cadet
activity and sport listservices.
The initial structure of WP-ORG was developed
by Ditus Bolanos '90. From the beginning WP-ORG has grown in
response to the West Point Community's requests for additional
support and service. A Board of Advisors including eleven USMA
graduates and two cadet parents ('02 & '04,'05,'07) oversee the day-to-day operations
at WP-ORG. Our cadet parent Advisor fills another role at WP-ORG
as a full-time employee responsible for handling feedback messages
received through the WP-ORG website. Dian Welle and Megan Klein
are the customer service face of WP-ORG.
Our purpose at WP-ORG is to support the
communication needs of the Service Academy Community.
WP-ORG has developed the functionality
to provide all 40,000 living West Point graduates with a Personal
Homepage (PHP) that converts, upon the death of a graduate, to
a Eulogy page for the gathering and display of testimonials and
pictures from classmates, family and friends.
We support online payment sites for the
collection of Society and Parent Club dues as well as registration
for club and society events.
A recurring question is, "How much
should I contribute to WP-ORG?". The average individual
contribution has been rising for the past 3 years from about
$30 to a little over $50 now. Our goal, however, is to double
the participation. WP-ORG encourages those who use its services
to consider a contribution that reflects the value they receive
from the WP-ORG services they use. The key to expanding your
knowledge and your use of WP-ORG services is to study the WP-ORG
homepage and simply click away and explore the functionality
provided. The homepage is located at: http://www.west-point.org.
Please take a few moments to check it out.
WP-ORG is a completely separate entity
and is independent of USMA and the Association of Graduates.
WP-ORG does work closely with both as it serves our primary interest
of serving the West Point Community. Through the Feedback links
on WP-ORG webpages, hundreds of queries are received from high
school students, scholars, former military, and other citizens
of the world seeking information about West Point. Remember our
web site has West Point in its name and USMA's and the AOG's
do not. This was not by design, as WP-ORG started nine years
ago with the name AOG.net. That name became important to the
AOG when they moved to have an internet presence. WP-ORG is quick
to pass to the appropriate USMA or AOG official those queries
more appropriately answered by these representatives.
WP-ORG is a labor of love of your classmates
and friends. Our semi-annual fundraisers maintain existing WP-ORG
resources, provide for the scheduled upgrade of hardware, and fund
the development of new offerings to support the West Point community.
The network architecture at WP-ORG has recently been redesigned to
take advantage of open-source software and technology that makes more
efficient use of hardware. This change, combined with a gradual
migration from tower to rack-mount servers, has cut our hardware
footprint to 1/8th of its previous size. Our imminent move to a co-location facility will double our bandwidth to the internet for the
same price we currently pay. Responsibility for the environment
surrounding our equipment and its physical security will be assumed
by the facility. We will also be establishing offsite backup servers
in Dallas and Los Angeles. At the same time our backend is being
upgraded, you will notice a facelist to the public face of WP-ORG.
Our homepage has been moved to Joomla and now hosts continually
updating West Point associated news. Joomla templates for class,
society and parent club websites are under development and will be
available within this next six-month cycle. So look for the changes
and be sure to tell us what you think.
Fund Drive 22 focuses on raising money
to support our employees, primarily tasked with the migration and
facelift of WP-ORG, operational expenses, system upgrades and a cushion
providing for unforeseen failures.
Our current budget may be seen here:
http://www.west-point.org/budget
WP-ORG, Inc. is
recognized by the IRS as a 501(C)(3) Non-Profit Organization.
100% of your donation is tax deductible.
Thank you for your continued
support. We operate only through your generosity.
Donate at:
or mail to:
WP-ORG
23802 Oscar Road
Spicewood TX 78669
| What Services
Are Offered by WP-ORG? |
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Two System Engineers;
Megan Price, in Austin, working on service-enhancement projects,
and Dian Welle, in Idaho, who handles the day-to-day requests
from our members. |
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Full point-to-point T1 channel
to the Internet. |
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USMA Class Support for the
classes from 1935 to present day (website hosting to include
a selection of content management systems, listservice hosting
and tailored reunion registration and payment). |
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http://www.west-point.org/class/
Example: USMA
1987 Website |
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