Plans for CEHD Admin Web Redesign

Plans for CEHD Admin Web Redesign

Background

Information guiding this document wasobtained from interviews with Jerry Rinehart, Vice Provost Student Affairs;ScottSlattery, Program Director, Student Academic Success Services;Paul Treuer, Director, Knowledge Management Center UMD; Carole Broad, Academic Advisor, CEHD Student Services;collaboration withCEHD Web Gurus and the 2007-08 CEHD Web Redesign Work Group.

Why Redesign?

Setting the University of Minnesota ahead of other big ten universities can be achieved by enhancing the student experience both at the undergraduate and graduate level. Done properly, mentoring a student during their academic career at CEHD will benefit their growth as a student and in turn benefit the college with higher retention and graduation rates.

The CEHD Web plays an integral role in this process as it serves to deliver information to prospective studentslocally and around the world, as well as the diverse range of current students. In addition, the Web must serve multiple facets of “non-students” internal and external to the University.

Moving Forward

Currently the CEHD Web is not focused on cohesively serving these areas. The concern here is not necessarily why it does not, as how the CEHD Web site can intentionally function for our users while simultaneously creating efficient shared information between research, academic and administrative units.

Audience: Students

The CEHD Web can serve as a hub to deliver the necessary information a student needs as he or she investigates CEHD as a possible investment in their future, and when here, provides the tools every step of the way to achieving their goals.

When structuring these materials, known as information architecture, we must keep in mind that even an honor roll student can be intimidated and lost by the college experience. A concerted effort to provide a seamless structure and concierge service will go a long way to serve our students well.

Granted a student must learn self-reliance over time to create their own path in life. Advisors and faculty have the strongest influence for students in this area. The Web will simply provide information relevant to the various stages of student growth. Through collaborative efforts between academic units and leveraging single-authoring technology we can provide custom collections of information across all areas of the Web while retaining accuracy and timely delivery of content.

Examples

An overview of all programs at CEHD can be hosted at the administrative level grouped to interest, career objective or by major/minor. Academic units can show full information for programs administered by the department. Both areas can show related opportunities in diversity initiatives, international study, and post graduate work. Leveraging University course guide and PCAS systems along with CEHD systems, the components of this information are written once and can be delivered accurately in as many variations as needed.

A first-year section can mirror and emphasize initiatives from advisors, faculty and the University, guiding new students through the college experience. Information relevant to academic units can be displayedon a department site. Again, this places relevant content where the user expects to find information.

The same type of initiative can be built for the second, third and forth years of the undergraduate CEHD experience, clearly outlining goals and resources for each stage of a student’s academic career.

A student able to find pertinent information can make better decisions and have a better experience at CEHD. This can lead to better retention and a faster maturity of the student as he or she will be able to focus on opportunities rather than feeling lost.

Such a structure will also serve as a recruiting tool. A prospective student will be able to see the care given to students and understand what they will receive from CEHD. This structure can go beyond the undergraduate experience to serve students pursuing licensure, certificates and graduate degrees.

Audience: Public Non-student

Non-student visitors to the CEHD Web seek resources and information useful to their lives or relevant to work. This is a wide range, from a member of the community enriching their understanding of a topic to a policy maker gathering information to support community initiatives. We also cater to non-students with special connections to the college, such as alumni.

Special interest stories on research and development in the college can be hosted on the Web as stand-alone stories. Using the principles of single authoring, stories can be grouped as any number of logical collections to target a specific audience and automatically link to more articles with similar topics. Leveraging multiple systems can also boost search engine rankings by topic, interest or keywords and serve as another door into the college.

Currently used for college news, events and courses, similar systems like the University Library blogs can be built for research, outreach, policies etc. Maintained by Web Gurus, information will stay current and accurate and be available for presentation to multiple audiences.

Initial Steps Moving Forward

Optimal Balance

• Meet with University Relations for guidance on University marketing initiatives and demographic information on current and prospective students.
• A natural fit as the Web Team is composed of designers that aggregate and distribute information through a technology medium which includes visual representation.
• Collaborative efforts go beyond the units of the college to span across the University.
• The Web Team has a long history of collaborating with University units and colleges.
• Identify CEHD administrative unit stakeholders, conduct interviews on what they want to achieve and who they want to target.
• Disseminate information with Web Advisory Group and determine the most efficient method to streamline information between research, academic and administrative units.
• The collaborative model is a proven successful process that serves as an information conduit to unit chairs and directors in tandem with senior management.

Accountability

With the administrative Web Guru assigned to the Web and Multimedia Team in the Academic and Information Technology office, a system for accountability should be put in place. Essentially the whole Web Team is now the administrative Web Guru. A member of the Senior Management Team should be selected to guide complex decisions influencing the CEHD Web site and help leverage University resources efficiently.

Transparency

The most important role the Web and Multimedia Team can serve to the University is as a conduit between Senior Management, Web Gurus and University offices that impact Web decisions. Beyond accountability, the most creative and impactful solutions are created when units work together. The sheer size of the University of Minnesota warrants the need for many academic and administrative units, we must accept this reality and meet the responsibility of maintaining open communication.

Timing and Logistics

The new Marketing Lead started in late April, has settled into her role and developed a workflow with the Design Lead. Interviews with administrative and academic units are already underway. The purpose is to map out logical placement of content to better serve Web users. This research is crucial to building a functioning college Web site as form will follow function. The major steps have been planned out for a new cohesive college site to launch in late December 2009.

June – Goals and Finalize IA

• Split out Web content, conducting interviews with administrative and academic units
• Web Advisory Group meeting to finalize results

July – Finalize Outcomes and Social Media

• Web Advisory Group meetings continue, check against 2008 Usability Lab results
• Social Media Web Guru workshops, leverage resources across college

August – Concepts and Wireframes, Student Web Group

• Develop three concepts based on group work
• Send wireframes to gurus for review
• Start design drafts
• Assemble student Web group

September – Focus Groups

• Run student and alumni focus groups on wireframes
• Build designs

October – Design Concepts

• Design concepts presented for review, Gurus, SMT, UR Marketing
• Visual design mapped to coding

November – Building Begins

• Coding mapped to system templates
• Content mapped to Excel and distributed for coordination

December – Testing, Integration, Live!

• Test out pages, correct errors streamline code
• Integrate with units, check linking against map
• Throw the switches and go live!

Supporting Infrastructure Work

On the technology side of our successful Web site is the work to leverage multiple tools at our disposal.

Google Search Appliance (GSA) – Three Levels

We have access to leverage three instances of the GSA at no cost above our investment of time. This involves properly structuring information on our site and working with each instance of GSA in the following manner.

College GSA–Display related keyword matches with search results allowing user to explore related content.

University GSA – Report preferred keyword matches to the University for GSA integration.

Google.com– Submit XML site map for accurate indexing of CEHD site.

Library Blogs

A content management system that is free crawled and indexed by Google. Easy to feed Blog content in fragments or as a whole throughout Web site with RSS technology.

Media Mill

Hosts and distributes video content by hand-coding derivatives, RSS feeds and podcasts.

OneStop Feeds

RSS feeds, alone or with program tool, deliver accurate course information to our sites lining directly back to OneStop for registration information.

Events Calendar

This has beenbigger success than predicted, allowing single authoring of events and announcements for use on college Web pages and beyond our site to custom user sites such as iGoogle. The core college calendar piloted a feature that allows the user to set wide parameters on events they would like to review. By retooling this calendar we will make it specific to each unit, changing itself like a chameleon to reflect whichever unit the user has selected.

SharePoint Designer

Software used by Web designers and editors, able to self-install on any college provided Windows computer. There is no cost for this software, unlimited licenses.