ABOUT THE NEW WEB DESIGN

As many of you know, the planning and development for a new version of the university’s website began in Fall of ’06 under the direction of the Web Management Committee, and was implemented by the University Web Developer and our design team.  The Web Management Committee’s work has focused on developing an extensive gateway infrastructure, a consistent university look, as well as one that reflects John Carroll University’s Mission, Vision, Core Values and Strategic Initiatives.

The new website is designed to be more intuitive, have increased clarity of navigation, consistency of structure, color and functionality, and a clean, fresh design. Along with the new elements of the design itself, each “pillar” of the site is managed by a Dreamweaver template and contains embedded programming for a site-specific search engine, which will add to our browsers’ ease of use.

WHAT ARE THE 'TIERS'?
When talking about the website and it's redesign, we use the concept of 'tiers'.  To better understand how the tier system works, below is a diagram that explains the concept.

JCU LANDING PAGE  - Tier One
The first tier of the JCU website is a gateway page, which serves as a funnel to the JCU Home Pages and also serves to celebrate breaking news headlines that celebrate JCU.

JCU HOME PAGES - Tier Two
These consist of primary administrative and organizational home pages, representing the major pillars of the University, represented by the blue tabs at the top of the landing page:  

• About JCU, Mission, Academics, Campus Life, Athletics and Alumni. 
  
  
• The tier two pages also include specific audience pages:  Undergrad Admission, Graduate Admission, Financial Aid, Current Students, Faculty and Staff, Employers and Media. 
  
  
• There are a few auxilliary informational pages also included in tier two, including: Search, JCU A-Z, Directories, Working at JCU and About Northeast Ohio.
  

With a some exceptions, the first two “layers” of the site (University Gateway Page and JCU Home Pages) went 'live' on August 22, 2007.  It is important to note that while these sites are as complete as possible as of the go live date, they are not 100% complete.  Between August 23 and the end of October 2007, we will be filling in any design, content and navigational structural gaps that exist in the primary top two tiers web structure. We encourage everyone in the JCU Community to notify us of any missing or broken links.  They will be repaired as quickly as possible.

TIER THREE
Concurrent with our design sweep of the top two tiers, we will also begin the process of working with TIER THREE level of the JCU Website:

• Departments, centers, institutes, university functions etc...

Understanding the current site contains several hundred thousand pages, we ask for your patience as we work toward completion of updating the entire site.

The web address will stay the same at www.jcu.edu http://www.jcu.edu

Should you have questions or comments about the newly designed website, please contact Tom Fulton, University Web Developer, at extension 3022, or email Tom at tfulton@jcu.edu. In addition, any technical problems you encounter, such as broken links, can be addressed by Tom.

Please note that most changes can be made for you with a simple notification.  However, if your request for a change requires a adjustment to the major link structure, the request will be brought before the Web Management Committe for consideration.

WEB MANAGEMENT COMMITTEE 

*Executive Committee
** Chairman
*** Non Voting Member

DESIGN TEAM
A huge thanks is due to the hard work of our programming team. Since the web redesign was placed on a fast track in late May of 2007, these talented folk stepped up to the plate and converted thousands of pages in the top two tiers.  Please extend your thanks to them if you come across them down the road.

Joel Mulner '07
Zack Hall '07
June Poole
Chris Paone '07
Kally Mavromatis

Thank you, 

Tom Fulton
University Web Developer