Tag Archives: IA

Alliance for Civic Engagement (ACE)

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Stakeholder: Peggy Burns

Website: http://www.middlebury.edu/academics/tools/ace

Redo Contact: Ryan Kellett

ACE is the most important resource on campus faculty interested in community-connected teaching, learning, and research-and for students who are interested in volunteering, social justice issues, activism and advocacy, citizenship, and international service opportunities.  ACE should be a portal for all things service-whether curricular, co-curricular, or extra-curricular.  In the current economic climate and as health and human services statewide budget cuts take effect, community needs change regularly-and because this is an active campus in terms of service, it is important that the site is perceived as dynamic and up to date/accurate.

Specifically and generally, what do you want from a new site? (as an individual and as an office)

-To have a prominent place on the overall Middlebury College site to promote current and future community-connected teaching, learning, and research opportunities to faculty.

-To have a prominent place on the overall Middlebury College site so that students (current and prospective) as well as faculty and staff interested in community service opportunities and social justice issues can find ACE easily.

-To promote immediate community service needs in a prominent way.

-To be able to promote specific opportunities (internships, conferences, on-campus events) to students.

-To have a number of different “Channels” (like we do now) to divide up the different portions of our site, e.g. Community Service, Anti-Poverty Initiatives, etc.

-ACE has so many pieces-we hope to find a coherent navigational “theme” that brings it all together.

What will help your office get things done more efficiently? How can a new website help your workflow?

-Easier and more flexible content creation, editing, photo/graphic use.

-Better forms (for nominations, community service sign-ups, etc.).

-Better way to archive/view old pages and photographs.

What type of interactivity would you use? What can help your office communicate more effectively?

-A calendar feed that we have on our website with ACE-related events that also automatically feeds into a larger campus-wide site-and have a way for RSVP to come to us plus have the event added to respondent’s Outlook calendar.  Also-a way to promote “outside” events as well via the calendar (e.g., an environmental rally in Burlington).

-A section that promotes professional development opportunities for faculty.

-An interactive calendar for faculty.

-Video (interviews with students and community partners, worksites in action, etc.).

-Video of faculty teaching community-connected courses; interviews with community partners involved in community-connected teaching, learning, and research.

-Opportunity for students, faculty, staff, and community partners to sign up for ACE e-newsletter.

-A way to enable students abroad to report on their service/internships/engagement there (but more formal than a blog, reviewed by ACE first).

-Link for recording volunteer hours (as part of student portal?).

-Online payment (e.g., for MAlt trips).

-How can we get alumni involved?

Do you have examples of functionality, design, or features from other colleges or industries that you like and admire?

-Sites of ACE-related offices (civic engagement, service learning, community service, citizenship, etc.) at Bowdoin http://www.bowdoin.edu/mckeen-center/index.shtml , Tufts http://activecitizen.tufts.edu/ , Amherst https://www.amherst.edu/academiclife/cce , and Swarthmore http://www.swarthmore.edu/langcenter.xml .  Also:  Georgetown, Macalaster, Princeton, Carleton, Bryn Mawr, and Colgate.

-We really want to have the capability to create “photo slideshows” on a regular basis-the type of slideshow where the picture changes automatically every few seconds. Here is an example of what we like: http://www.colgate.edu/DesktopDefault1.aspx?tabid=1870. Here is an example of what we don’t want: http://www.middlebury.edu/admissions/gallery/?galleryImage=0 because you have to click “next” each time.

If you currently create or edit pages on any of our web sites, what functionality is good? What could be improved?

-We like that we can create content (e.g., a new News and Events story) and add it immediately to the website without going through a lengthy or bureaucratic approval process.

-We would like it if there were a better system for the News and Events Feed archives… right now they just run down the right-sidebar in a long column.

-We would like ACE to be able to use both the left and right sidebars (if the new system has both sidebars). Right now we can only use our right side-bar although some offices use both sides.

-Web stats!  We need information on who visits the ACE page-and which section(s) are most visited.

-Less “homemade” looking-e.g., it’s so obvious when the home page looks great, but other pages look just cobbled together (not arguing for total conformity, just a conformity in overall graphic appeal).  More opportunity/options for choosing design emphasis (heads, etc.).

-More seamless and clarifying links to collaborating departments (e.g., CCAL).

-Better search is critical.

Athletics

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Form of contact: Meeting with Coaches, AD, and Stakeholder

Stakeholder: Brad Nadeau

WebRedo Contact: Jamie Northrup

Website: http://www.middlebury.edu/athletics

Brief: The Athletics Department is interested in a few key areas- a more interactive site overall with photos, video, and interaction, the ability to customize individual team pages, and a better recruiting interface.

Athletics Requirements:

  • Upload/display/show/imbed video
  • Mobile score updates through current scoreboard interface designed by web services
  • Easy blogging for coaches
  • Easily upload audio sound/interviews to be played
  • Online store through bookstore to sell athletic merchandise
  • Flexibility for displaying different fonts/colors/sizes of text etc…
  • Ability for podcasts/RSS feeds
  • Way to display photos for potential purchase, thumbnails, full-size etc. aka-photo store
  • Top level visibility (don’t hide athletics)
  • Athletics template that can be customized with photos
  • Athletics wants to design/control IA for their site
  • Want mouse-over / menu display functionality
  • New recruiting functionality

Art Department and Slide Museum

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Dana Barrow, Visual Resources Assistant (443-5546)

I’m working with Monica McCabe on the art history and studio art sites:

Monica McCabe, Academic Coordinator, History of Art/Studio Art (443-5234)

Websites I’m re-doing:

  • History of Art and Architecture department website
  • Studio Art department website
  • Visual Resources website

What we’d like to do:

  • Create a new graphic design that mixes art images and short blocks of text
  • Generate new content focused on the people and facilities in the art departments (example: faculty and student profiles), as well as informational content (example: courses and requirements, downloadable forms)
  • Create clear, new information architecture to organize our new content
  • Add photo galleries, video/audio clips, and social networking tools

Areas where I know I need help:

  • Creating video (example: short faculty and student interviews, images of student work, panoramic images of studio spaces)
  • Conceptualizing dynamic (i.e. effective, not necessarily flashy) was to present photo galleries
  • Conceptualizing  dynamic navigation

Ideas from Shel Sax that we’d like to follow up on:

  • A proposal for a winter term class for video making next January (2010) so we can create high quality video clips
  • Creating a space on our site where students (HARC and SA) can create portfolios.  (The model is teacher education.)  This might be a good place to use social networking tools.
  • Fostering some kind of convergence with Segue (examples: portal with access to online exams, course websites, and student portfolios)

General list of things we’d like to do/have (in no particular order):

Information about people in the department

  • Short profiles of faculty, visiting architects, students, and alumni (I will create list of people.)  Models are “My Midd Experience” and the short format of the bios in theater programs with accompanying photos.  Could involve short questions for faculty such as, What is your most recent accomplishment?
  • An online magazine for a more in-depth look at who is studying abroad, faculty research and projects, student projects, etc.  Model might be International Studies magazine (http://www.middlebury.edu/academics/ump/majors/is/)
  • A feature where HARC faculty talk briefly about their favorite works in college art museum
  • Place where we can link to external info about faculty and students (example: College alumni magazine will be doing a feature on John Hunisak and we would like to link to this

Images

  • Images of our studio spaces (studio art and also architectural studies)
  • Photo galleries of student work
  • Photo galleries of faculty art work

Information

  • Info on courses and requirements (SA + HARC)
  • Info on planning your major, including study abroad (HARC – link this to student portfolios)
  • Downloadable forms (HARC – or make this part of student portfolios)
  • Put our department calendar online (HARC – maybe)
  • Special page on architecture and the environment (HARC)
  • Page about student work exhibitions (SA)
  • How-to info on VR site (could be in form of blog or wiki)

Technical Stuff

  • Support for Flash (studio art would like their site to be animated in some way, HARC doesn’t require this)
  • Ability for VR staff, academic coordinator, faculty, and students to add materials to various portions of the site
  • Ability to integrate images into site design (e.g. images of faculty and student art, images from museum collection)
  • A way to create student portfolios online (maybe use Segue)

Inspiring website we like:

  • Some of the pages on the Rhode Island School of Design website (http://www.risd.edu/undergraduate)
  • What we like about it: clear architecture, video, photo galleries, integration of art images into the design

History of Art and Architecture

Courses + Requirements

Faculty office hours

Students and alumni

Visiting the department

Resources (artstor, VR collection, museum)

Photos

Contact

Studio Art

Courses + Requirements

Faculty + Office Hours

News

Facilities

Study Abroad

Student Gallery

Visiting Artist Program

Contact

Sculpture in the form of a chair (photos)

Visual Resources Collection

Note: Made in CMS but links to pages made in another program

Collection Holdings

Stats on our facility and others’ facilities

Breadloaf School of English (BLSE)

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Jan. 29, 2009

Attending:  Sanda Legault, Judy Jessup, Elaine Lathrop, Lexa DeCourval, Karen Browne, Susan Holcomb with Renee Brown and Shel Sax

One major complaint was the Middlebury branding, student profiles that are undergraduate focused which doesn’t work for Bread Loaf. – would like to have the ability to use BL appropriate content. Love the fact that BLSE is well-positioned on the College’s home page along with MIIS, Writers Conference, etc.

Unlike other groups on campus, BLSE has its own communication/conferencing/email program, Breadnet (First Class software) that it uses for communications, particularly during the summers when the 4 campuses are in session. During that time, many students don’t use the Middlebury College web page, since all available relevant information is accessible from Breadnet.

Types of information: very basic information is currently there but have talked about photos, something like a Facebook page that connects applicants to current students, etc.

  • overview at BLSE page – with who we are, what we do, faculty
  • information that we have is there but the CMS standards are too rigid and have prevented BLSE from changing content – so the original content was mostly straight from the catalog and that’s what’s still there – this summer, looking to have a media section where they can put podcasts – this is an idea for the reunion – also issues with permissions for a large scale podcast initiative
  • integration with Banner Web is critical, particularly for the online applications process.
  • online application is confusing to students – students from the Language Schools apply to BLSE, for example

Navigation/Search:

  • Want to make sure that the inquiry process is in place for admissions, so that online applications and forms work well from the current web page. – some students need assistance but typically because they don’t read the available online instructions
  • some things are very hard to find e.g. webcams, campus map, etc.
  • search function is not a big help but a site map would be a big help. – are there people to advise on the better way to structure the site and to do more creative and interesting things
  • people want to get to information with only a few clicks

Requested Features/Functionality

  • areas for growth including online newsletter, audio and video of presentations, plays, readings, etc.,
  • online community for alums and current students, BLTN for example
  • Single log on and customization of individual pages would be desirable
  • Unique factor about BLSE is the use of FirstClass (Breadnet) for communication and some document sharing. Otherwise, use Ocelot
  • Having a link to Breadnet would be useful
  • Forms, applications, etc. are typically Banner based or on Ocelot
  • Definitely want embedded photos, video, podcasting, etc.
  • visual map for the various campus, virtual tours of the 4 campuses
  • Want to have students submit and publish photos taken by BL’ers with some control.
  • Ability to create summer content that would be easy to turn on and turn off as the yearly cycle turns. How to communicate with students during the yearly cycle that permits the targeting of specific subsets of the BLSE community.
  • Want different types of information – some general for non-enrolled students, faculty, etc. and then have a log in for students, faculty and staff to access more individualized information.
  • Ability to ‘push’ information rather than publish information. – RSS feeds might be of use, but assumes that people use RSS feeds and it is not clear how to create such an environment
  • For example, want to let enrolled students in Vermont that theater tickets are available, but don’t want this information to go to BLSE students on other campuses.
  • want something to facilitate the publishing of images on the web, automating the optimization of the image size, etc.

Workflow – current & desired

  • Interested in having multiple editors with one or two ‘approvers’
  • would like a way to individualize the application forms for BLSE – and looking to put course registration online
  • Use pdf files, and forms that interact with Banner.
  • Note that students range in age from young to old and the older cohorts have difficulties navigating the web site and online forms – there’s lot of individualized assistance provided by the BLSE staff
  • lack of use of credit cards is an issue

International Student and Scholar Services (ISSS)

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Stakeholder: Kathy Foley-Giorgio and Kaye-Lani Laughna
Website: http://www.middlebury.edu/campuslife/diversity/isss/
WebRedo Contact: Ryan Kellett / Pooja Shahani

General: “ISSS provides advising, programs, services, and support to our international students, staff, and faculty who come to study and work at Middlebury College in our many programs (13 summer Language Schools, the Bread Loaf School of English on three U.S. campuses and one site abroad, Bread Loaf Writer’s Conference, and the undergraduate college).  ISSS manages the College’s involvement in the U.S. government’s Student & Exchange Visitor System (SEVIS) as well as institutional compliance with related immigration regulations.  We also coordinate International Student Orientation and the Friends of International Students (FIS) host program.”

Requirements:

  • Varied constituencies: ISSS has wide variety of users from current students  but also a large group of alumni that also are required by law to be in contact with Middlebury/ISSS. Feeding the right information to the correct constituents is an important part of what ISSS. Finding new and unique ways to push new and timely information to constituents is important and needed.
  • Forms/Documents: ISSS hosts a lot of internal and governmental forms, some of which are PDFs, printable documents (which are sent back and then printed in hard copy). ISSS needs an organized way to serve and push this information out to constituents especially when deadlines are near or if information changes.
  • Government Interface: Is there any way to interface with online government forms that are currently filled out through ISSS? We were brainstorming about how to create fillable forms that would directly come back to our office in a legible way, unlike the current fillable forms that do not make sense once they are submitted, as they come back in paragraph form rather than the form in original form.
  • Multi-language support: Some ISSS users do not speak/write English. Language or at least graphic suport for this is requested. Either way, simplicity is key.
  • CMS: New CMS must be easier to manipulate and more flexible so that content can be posted faster. ISSS can do content updates but requires one-time consultation/assistance in rethinking new ways to display and interface information. CMS currently too much of a burden as a tack-on to job requirements. LIS support for CMS is key.
  • International Alumni: ISSS requests a way to remain in contact with these particular alumni because ISSS maintains immigration records for them. Automatic reminders and notifications of changes should be pushed to alumni. A place to continue contact, conversation, networking through ISSS is also requested.
  • Alumni: Single accessible database for alumni updates. In particular, ISSS finds that alumni update the school with information but that information is not then shared college-wide. A single database of alumni records is needed.
  • Newsletters: ISSS would like to support an online newsletter that is easy to draft and send without email.
  • External audience: international host families should be able to research and apply online to the program. Ability to manage those applications online.
  • Feedback forms: Need for data collection about services and if constituents’ needs are being met.
  • Multimedia: Would like to welcome visitors with more photos, colors, etc.
  • IA: ISSS requests assistance with cleaning up their information architecture which has evolved to be a bit unwieldly since it is currently organzed with redundant information for multiple constituents.Fewer pages needed, drop-down menus requested.