December 1996
May 1997
August 2004 (launched Fall 2000)
April 2006 (launched August 2004)
The AAMC gave its "Award of Excellence" to the magazine for its multimedia Web Extras feature, in the Electronic Communications, Rich Media category. Web Extras includes video, audio, podcasts, and photo galleries to enhance the editorial content of the magazine. The judges called Web Extras "a top-notch job" that "creatively merge the strength of printed and electronic media to provide information to
stakeholders."
The late Paul Gennaro, Dartmouth Medical School's Web Architect, was the driving force behind Web Extras, and it was always a pleasure to see Paul shooting video for the features. We miss Paul, and this award is a terrific testament to his talent and creativity.
In addition to the Award of Excellence, Dartmouth Medicine received an Award of Distinction in the "Publications, External Audience Periodicals" category.
]]>"Does the content featured on the Dartmouth Home Page get an increase in traffic?"
Absolutely! For example, this story from Dartmouth Life was recently featured and unique visitors to the site more than tripled.
"How does content get featured on the Dartmouth Home Page? What's the process?"
The features, news, events and other content that appears on the Dartmouth Home Page is carefully selected and prepared by the Office of Public Affairs in collaboration with the campus community. It's far from a solo effort, and we couldn't do it without your help. If you have suggestions for content, we'd love to hear from you!
"How do you handle exchanging links with companies outside of Dartmouth?"
Simply put, we just don't do enter into exchange agreements with outside parties. There's technically no policy on this, but we don't make a habit of promoting outside businesses. We're an academic institution, after all. Now, whenever relevant and appropriate, we certainly will link to the outside world, but never for profit or to improve web traffic.
"What about content for mobile devices?"
The current version of Dartmouth Home does indeed display on mobile devices. It's quite a challenge due to the wide spectrum of devices and lack of solid standards. We're excited about doing more with mobile content in the future!
"Who are the top audiences for Dartmouth Home?"
Since our range of audience is so broad, we try to be as inclusive as possible on Dartmouth Home and intentionally don't limit the site to certain groups of users. This may seem like a daunting task, but the response has been very positive so far.
Currently in prototype, Dartmouth Daily Updates is an electronic news digest sent to faculty, staff and students each day (if there are items awaiting publication). Dartmouth Daily Updates complements other print and electronic communication methods to Dartmouth faculty, staff, and students, such as department communiques, official bulk email messages, and the Dartmouth online event calendar. Have a look at the prototype in action.
"Some announcements will also be an event and vice versa... how to manage that overlap?"
When people submit events to D2U, we will redirect them to the Events calendar. But we agree that this is a confusing aspect of the system.
"Is this meant to replace blitz bulletins?"
Not intentionally, but it seems to be an incremental step in that direction. There's so much great information in Blitz Bulletins, and it would be great to move it to a more open environment.
"Any plans to implement authentication or authorization?"
Great question. We need to look into access more in depth. As with events/announcements, this is more of a policy decision than a technical one. We still need to decide whether the updates should be accessible only by Dartmouth folks.
"How long will the announcements live online?"
Currently they are available through the site for 90 days.
Public Affairs and Web Services have just put the finishing touches on a new web template based on the recent redesigned Dartmouth Home. It's available to all Web Services clients, and should start being released soon. Keep an eye out for it!
]]>We've done some tweaking, mostly to the pages for Prospective Students and for Alumni, and added a page for Parents and Families. All three of those were in response to initial and continuing feedback from the community and from the offices most directly responsible to those constituencies.
Of course, we continue to get feedback through the "Contact Dartmouth" email address; we're responding to those messages as appropriate and forwarding others also appropriate to other areas of the College. As you might imagine, most of the traffic at this time of year has to do with Admissions, but we're getting plenty of "suggest a link" type of messages, too.
All of this is to say that the Dartmouth Web site will continue to evolve based on the needs of our users. We believe in our original principle of "user-centered design," and will continue to develop the site based on that principle.
I'm also continually on the hunt for new, interesting and cool content to feature in the "Up Front" section of the home page; if you know of something that might fit the bill, whatever that might be -- a new Web page, audio, video, images, anything on the Dartmouth Web -- email me.
As always, thanks for all the great input we've gotten. The response has been tremendous, and we're looking forward to the continued development and evolution of the site.
-- Rick
]]>This is the third iteration of the Dartmouth home page in which I've been involved, and it's been the most satisfying. Of course, you never get everything you want, and we've had to make some compromises along the way in several areas. But, in the end, we believe we've got a site that will serve Dartmouth, and the site's visitors, well.
I want to acknowledge the help of many people along the way, especially Alan German in Dartmouth's Web Publishing Services, who developed the customizable QuickLinks feature that's been so well received, and Susan Warner of Publications, who's come aboard in the past two weeks to give us a fresh editorial eye. And, of course, the many, many people who've offered feedback, participated in user testing and focus groups, and our Web town meetings; all of whom have been so valuable in helping us remake this site. We couldn't have done this without all of you. Thanks.
And so, back to the tweaking. Watch for the new site tomorrow morning ...
]]>After months of talking and reading and questioning and analyzing, we've finally turned our attention to the surface layer of the new web site. We've created a mockup for the home and second-level pages and are now looking for feedback.
]]> We will discuss the design at the next Web Town Meeting (August 3, 2006, 3-4:30, Carson L01 - come and bring your friends!) but... in order to transcend the boundaries of space and time, we decided to try posting the mockups here in our blog so that we can discuss the design virtually.Our blog is configured so that comments are reviewed before they are posted. This is partly to keep from inadvertently advertising ringtones, poker games, and who knows what else! But also, we review the comments to keep the discussion productive. That said, we are not likely to approve comments like "I love it!" or "I hate it!" but rather thoughtful comments that invite further discussion.
So take a look at home and page, bearing in mind that the mockups are images of web pages - not actual web pages, and let us know what you think. Post to the blog or email me (sarah.horton@dartmouth.edu), Rick (rick.adams@dartmouth.edu), or Martin (martin.grant@dartmouth.edu) directly if you'd rather comment offline. We really want to hear from you!
]]>The survey lists the same tasks that we were using for our face-to-face testing and asks people to indicate which link they would use to accomplish each task. We hope the survey results will reveal which links are solid and which are a little fuzzy around the edges. We also expect to get more general feedback on the wireframe. We'll probably also hear from some respondents about the current design.
We'll report back on how well a survey works for this sort of information architecture road-test.
]]>“10 Tips on Writing the Living Web”
I’m starting to feel the muse …
]]>After walking folks through our research process and findings and some of the basics of what we're envisioning as the navigation for the new site, we opened it up to conversation about the site. I offered that Dartmouth's Web site is a shared concern: it's not just what we think the site should be, but that everyone at the College has an interest in how Dartmouth is represented on the Web.
That said, there weren't any surprises (at least to me) in what folks wanted to talk about: how we get visitors to the site to content, how the search engine works, how the life of the College is highlighted on the site. We also ran an exercise on imaging: a series of "mood boards" showing a variety of images of the College that represent various aspects. Again, not surprisingly, folks prefer dynamic, energetic images of teaching, learning and living at Dartmouth. They were less enthusiastic about the more conservative, traditional campus beauty shots of flowers and architecture.
It was, we think, a good conversation. One that we're likely to repeat soon.
Martin's got some more formal notes; stay tuned for a posting on that. (Likely to come early in the week ... we're spending some time this weekend getting out from behind our computers and enjoying the spring.)
]]>The thing about travel destination sites is that they are not designed for people who live in these places, but rather for people who are considering visiting.
I also looked at museums, thinking they are educational destinations:
These are closer, but still they are outward-facing sites geared toward an external audience. I expect they have some kind of intranet to facilitate the day-to-day workings of the organization.
I also looked at these organizations that seemed similar to higher education in some respect (listed here in no particular order):
Great sites, but none addresses the specialized needs of people who inhabit the place or organization, whereas almost every higher ed site I've visited does. Hum... do they know something we don't know?
What do you think - is there any other enterprise like higher education? And should schools attempt to serve all audiences with a single "home page?"
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May 1997
August 2004 (launched Fall 2000)
April 2006 (launched August 2004)
We (the HomeTeam) have completed the research phase of Dartmouth's home page redesign, and it looks like we're ready to head into the design phase. First and foremost, we want to thank all of the members of the Dartmouth community -- students, faculty, staff, alumni and parents -- who took part in our focus groups, our user testing, and our online survey. Your interest and your comments really form the foundation of our work, and for that we're grateful.
We've got some of the literature that we found useful in the research process posted on our HomeTeam Web page. Also posted is the results of our user survey, conducted in late February, and our research review highlights. Feel free to have a look and let us know what you think.
We'll also be posting the results of some of our other research, including our analysis of server logs, search engine logs, and the focus groups and user testing. That bit of housekeeping might take a little while, as we're focusing our energy on setting about to actually design the new page. So bear with us.
And stay tuned: soon we'll have some things to show and tell as we move through the various stages of the design phase. As always, your feedback is welcome.
Fasten your seatbelts ...
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