Tag Archives: photos

The Commons and Orientation

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Stakeholder: Katy Abbott
Website: http://www.middlebury.edu/campuslife/commons and http://www.middlebury.edu/campuslife/events/orientation
Redo Contact: Ryan Kellett

General: Orientation in both February and September is run, in part, by CCAL (JJ Boggs). There are five commons, each with unique personality and work processes. This report represents all five commons.

Orientation Requirements:

  • Constant Update: the orientation website is unique in that information changes almost daily, especially in the several weeks prior to Orientation which takes place in September and February. That said, the authors of these updates are far and wide since Orientation brings in many areas of the College. It is essential to both have a “working space” for information updates and then a one-click solution to immediately reflect those changes on outward-facing website which is presented to all incoming first-years. Currently, it is far too cumbersome to update the site that often and results in misinformation among first-years who then choose to call in or email.
  • Workflow: The collection of people in charge of Orientation do not have the time or background to necessarily update the website. They have other roles at the College and therefore updating falls to the wayside.
  • AskHiba: It would be nice to have an AskHiba-type (http://askhiba.wordpress.com/) place for first-years to ask questions and receive answers from peers (both upperclassmen and other first-years). This would relieve some of the pressure of calls and emails while still being quite personal. Students should be able (and are likely willing) to run this site. If it’s possible, it would be nice to dynamically feed a FAQ from these questions and answers.
  • Facebook: Start “official” Facebook groups for the admitted students (which then turn into first-years). It should be official in that the school or a Middlebury student moderates it, but it should not be moderated by the Orientation committee. Link our pages into this group.
  • Text Online: find a better way to display lots of info in CMS rather than lists and PDFs.
  • Visually Stimulating: better visual appeal and presentation of orientation information. Rollover graphics would be nice.
  • Similar CCAL (Doug Adams) functionality: online forms, payment, ticketing, embedded interactive media, etc. We do need to be able to take reservations and payment on line.  Class photos, Bread Loaf accommodations, and more mean that having that capacity would be ideal.

Commons Requirements:

  • FYS and Sophomore Experience: Find ways to support the first-year seminars and sophomore experience as part of the 4/2 Commons System. This could take the form of displaying some of the work from the FYS, as fed up through class blogs or websites. This should not require students to do any more work than they already do — should be automated in feeding up content to populate some sort of display of the Commons experience
  • Dynamic Bulletin Boards: Commons are often places to post information (for example in weekly “newsletter” type publications that are posted in bathrooms). An online space (message board, wiki, or wall?) for such activity might be nice but must be sure not to compete with other online spaces. If underused, it becomes useless. Some sort of moderation/vetting needs to be in place.
  • Neighborhood: there should be a way of identifying students online (within the Middlebury universe) as from a certain commons.
  • Deans and Faculty Heads: There should be a better way to connect with deans and faculty heads which are the “family” within the Commons. A lot of emails go out from Commons Coordinators that say: “faculty heads have tickets available for these performances” or “the dean reminds you to bundle up because of extra cold weather this week!” These types of announcements are common but finding a way for deans/faculty heads to connect (but also get information from) is important.

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

Middlebury College Museum of Art

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Stakeholder: Doug Perkins
Current: http://museum.middlebury.edu/
WebRedo Contact: Mike Roy

General: The Middlebury College Museum of Art is an AAM-accredited museum serving the students, faculty, and staff of Middlebury College as well as local and regional residents of and visitors to Addison County and the Champlain Valley. The museum preserves and displays the college’s permanent collection and offers 5-7 traveling loan exhibits each year to as many as 18,000-20,000 visitors. We serve as a visual resource for a broad spectrum of courses across the college’s curriculum, most notably the departments of History of Art and Architecture and Studio Art, though in any given year we are likely to work with courses in religion, languages, music, philosophy, anthropology, American studies, classical studies, English and American literature, environmental studies, theater, and teacher education. In addition, we welcome nearly 1,000 local K-12 school students to the museum each year through the Museum Assistants Program, a volunteer docent program that offers Middlebury College students a chance to learn about the museum and to lead tours. The museum also oversees and maintains a collection of 20 works of public art displayed around the Middlebury campus, and the museum director chairs the Committee on Art in Public Places.

Requirements:

Needs
* flexibility with respect to aesthetics and typography
* have a portion of the museum home page that shows the next several upcoming museum events
* ability to create email lists to allow patrons to subscribe to relevant lists
* offer RSS feeds for museum press release pages
* maintain the majority of the current site’s look
* participate in brand mapping exercises and discussions related to the college’s brand and sub brands
* online credit card membership form
* e-commerce capability for museum bookstore directly through museum site
* flash banners
* rotating home page image with a click through
* ability to allow people to control font size easily (for accessibility/readability) with one click
* alt text balloons that follow the cursor so that image captions are noticeable (e.g.
http://www.louvre.fr/llv/commun/home.jsp?bmLocale=fr_FR

* online forms for teacher workshop and school group registration

* video-taped lectures for podcasts and vodcasts linked to exhibits (e.g. Art in Public Places iPod tour)

* ability to link to press published electronically on the campus newspaper site as well as other news sites (Addison Independent, BFP, Seven Days, e.g.) and maybe have those stories pulled into a sidebar

* ability to zoom in on images as well as 360 degree image rotation

* online searchable database of the museum collection that is linked to the library’s online catalogue search function so that when students search for books or other media related to objects in the museum collection they will be alerted that the museum holds works that are relevant to their subject

Wants
* be involved in focus groups and usability as design process begins
* create a ‘museum module’ that users could choose to put on their customizable middlebury.edu home page that would allow pushing of info about exhibits, events, and other museum news to users’ customizable home page
* liquid layout, or at least a wider fixed width (950 pixels)
* enable comments on exhibit pages to allow visitors to leave their thoughts about exhibits and related events
* offer virtual audio and video tours either streaming through the site or for download
* allow museum Friends to RSVP on-line for members-only events
* distribute 8.5×11 .pdfs of posters (for printing and distributing at schools, etc.)
* high-quality videos of classroom discussions about art
* tagging
* facebook site (fans of the museum) to reach people through facebook
* ability to create online versions of exhibits with unique appearance (i.e. NOT within existing templates)
* updated design treatment for the Committee on Art in Public Places (CAPP) website that creates a visual link between CAPP and the museum

Nice-to-Haves

* allow students to create their own online exhibits from items in the museum collection (e.g. like what the pachyderm project might allow)

ES/EA/Sustainability Integration (SI)

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Stakeholder: Jack Byrne

Redo Contact: MS Costanza-Robinson

Currently, ES/EA/SI has a relatively low-tech site that includes text and photos on their page and has a variety of file types for download (powerpoint files of presentations, pdfs of reports and newsletters). This functionality needs to remain, but be expanded and improved upon. The current status of the site is due largely to limited personnel time dedicated to the website. A recent (1-year only) hire will have some role in introducing content and improvements. Requests and or plans for future functionality/technology include:

  • Embedded video and/or audio (e.g., of the weekly ES Colloquium or other seminars)
  • Better access (possible including standard reports) to better web-use statistics
  • Ability to easily form Listservs or groups that specifically include non-Midd addresses (not just built within Outlook) and the ability to generate an email newsletter to the listserv participants; people should be able to subscribe and unsubscribe.
  • Training / portal functions
  • Tagging/aggregating/approving sustainability information from across the website (athletics, EA, SI, IS) and feed it to the ES/EA/SI site
  • Add ability to accept online submission of grant proposals (see URO stakeholder report for more on this requirement)
  • Add searchable archive of ES/EA/SI funding (proposals/reports from previous grant awards) or perhaps of Environmental Council minutes of meetings (see Faculty Council requirement document)
  • Integration of databases across campus and web-output of data: for example Facilities has a lot of information (facility energy consumption, building occupants) that Jack needs. The current process includes too many file-type conversions and people involved in getting the right information. The data exist, but the searches/databases (Sightlines?) are not web-based. Obviously, permissions issues would be important here.
  • The possibility for people to web-submit photos/ideas/text for the website for possible inclusion on the page.

Specific problems with the current site/CMS that were mentioned

  • Tiny blue font
  • CMS awkwardness – simplify direct editing of pages (uploading too many clicks, particularly when you upload the wrong file by accident, to remove that and upload the correct one takes far too many clicks; what you see (even in preview mode) isn’t always what you get)
  • CMS editor permissions issues: student workers have historically done some of the content management for ES/EA/SI. Jack Byrne, as the person in charge of these areas, would like privileges to set-up/approve student permissions. Currently, the administrative hurdles here are time-consuming.
  • Channel pages creating/editing: is it possible to reduce administrative bottlenecks
  • Improve ability to edit CMS on Macs

Specific non-technological requests/thoughts for new site

  • Increase EA/SI prominence on webpage (homepage?)
  • Branding is important, but the flexibility of many templates would be helpful
  • More training – existing training is good, but more could be useful on more topics