U of MD School of Nursing Web Redesign Blog

Internal Center of Excellence Page

2009-07-10T09:40:00.003-04:00

This is basically what the Center of Excellence template will look like:

Comments? Questions?

More to Come After Independence Day...

2009-07-02T12:45:00.008-04:00

Early next week we will be meeting with those associated with the Centers of Excellence in Research to discuss templates and how those unique "Center" pages will look.

Other than that we're in the process of finalizing the site as it is built. Up to this point we were dealing mainly with images and mock ups designed in Photoshop, and now we've begun the process of breaking up those images into actual Web pages.

This is all being done behind the scenes and should be fully developed and ready for testing in a few weeks.

Stay tuned, and enjoy your holiday weekend!

Our Project Timelines

2009-06-26T12:48:00.006-04:00

We're heading down the home stretch for our Web redesign project. Once we build out pages we'll begin testing, and from there we'll make tweaks here and there -- depending on user/testing input.

He is our project timeline, in case you have comments or questions (click on image for a larger view):

Final Designs

2009-06-25T14:42:00.009-04:00

Here are our final designs, after a few more meetings and input from faculty:

Homepage

Secondary Page

Center of Excellence in Research Welcome Page

Moving Ahead with Site Development

2009-06-12T08:55:00.004-04:00

With feedback taken into account from everything we've done to this point: the open forum, the blog, surveys, interviews, emails, and meetings -- we are moving ahead with the actual development of the new site.

The approved designs (homepage and secondary page) will be sliced and diced, as they are brought to life via the scripting of XHTML (eXtensible HyperText Markup Language) and CSS (Cascading Style Sheets).

That means that the designs will become interactive as we move into July. We should be able to begin alpha testing in July and beta testing in August.

If you'd like to help out with testing our new site please contact me via email or leave a comment on the blog and I will get in touch with you.

Newest Concepts & Drafts

2009-06-09T13:35:00.009-04:00

Homepage revisions:

Secondary page concept:

Centers of Excellence concept:

What do you think?

Next Step: Open Forum, June 9, Noon-1, Room 730

2009-05-28T08:41:00.005-04:00

Now that we have input from everyone (see prior blog post) we will make any alterations to the chosen homepage. We are also working on second and third tier page templates.

Those templates, along with a final homepage, will be revealed in an "Open Forum" on Tuesday, June 9 from 12-1 p.m. in room 730. We invite all faculty, staff, students, friends, and alumni to the forum.

We will explain a bit about our redesign process so far, show the final drafts (and get feedback), and we'll talk about next steps in the redesign process.

If we stay on schedule, we will begin alpha and beta testing in the middle of July and officially launch in the middle of August.

Please contact me (hantman@son.umaryland.edu) if you'd like to help out with testing.

The Second Survey Is Complete!

2009-05-26T09:25:00.008-04:00

423 people took survey!

Design Preferences:

278 preferred the red design
109 preferred the yellow design
33 liked both designs

Survey Demographics:

110 Alumni
67 Current Students
38 Faculty Members
10 Friends or Donors
119 Other
33 Prospective Students
37 Staff Members
3 UM System Employees

Select Comments:

Nice top navigation…
The design is unlike many other websites
Love "By the Numbers" section -- assuming facts will rotate?
The label for the red buttons aren't consistent
Remember, you should also include an area where ALERTS will be posted to the home page
Apply Now ribbon items are too prominent for their station; will be utilized less than other items Very top in black frame- "Apply now" ribbon, makes it too busy What's the difference between public affairs and media?
I would create a distinction between the Upcoming Events and Recent News
Size of links differentiates what is most important to the site; student login should be bolder on top right permanent position
The "buttons" under the photo make the site VERY easy to navigate
I like that the page is not cluttered with text or pictures--everything stands out, and this makes it easy to find information on the page. I don't know about your navigation structure, but i would expect it not to be too cluttered...
The page seems designed for 1024x768 screens, but the image still has some horizontal scrolling that I hope will not be necessary on the actual site
My monitor is set for 1024 wide and I had to scroll to see the page
My primary concern is that there are 4 menus to consider. The site is very clean and directed to the events and main red buttons, but the other nav (2 on top one on right) are lost because we are not expecting to look for multiple navigation menus
I noticed that it does not fit on my monitor
The school colors are incorporated in a cool way i would spend more time at this site
It is very eye-catching and i really feel the need to navigate that design much more
I like the easy to find link to Shady Grove
Concept one is simple and efficient ,representative of the nursing professional in general
Overall, I think this design is a fresher look and more items "pop"
Much more aesthetically pleasing, there is better contrast between the bottom "upcoming events" part and the side tabs in grey so they are more easily found, the tabs to click on are only on the right side making the website more organized and less cluttered. The red design is overall a much better choice
Well, for prospective students, it is easy to find where to apply
I love it! I love the upcoming event and recent view area. I love the links to the right in gray. I love the pictures leading to news events. I really like this! Much better then the current site. And I LOVE BY THE NUMBERS!!!
This website allows students to envision themselves in a vibrant and diverse student population. These students look like up and coming young professionals
I like the color combination, they remind me of the school colors, the singular list of links on the right keeps the look clean
Fresh, professional, inviting
Holds attention with colors and layout. Seems to reach out to the reader (me). Easier to move around on the page
Upbeat
Innovative, easy to understand, good colors, logical formatting
Easy to see the upcoming events and recent news
Clarity, color, and 3 d wrap
The "information for" section in the right hand column is better than going across the top in design 2
3D design – it’s awesome!!
Very clear, clean, professional, yet gives a good visual identity of the School.
I prefer the red background; I think it is more eye-catching. I also like the illusion that banners wrap around the white foreground.
I like the colors and crispness of the look. I like that there are tabs for everything so that you do not have to hunt for what you are looking for.
Seeing them side-by-by side, I realize I like having items on only one side of the photo; the yellow background concept feels more cluttered because there is something around the photo on all sides that I need (or should) pay attention too and therefore I'm not sure what to focus on
I’d like to see a merger of both – layout from 2 with colors of 1

The Winner Is!

More to come soon....

Take the Survey & Comment on Our Architecture

2009-05-19T13:50:00.006-04:00

THANK YOU for taking the survey, if not...

TAKE THE SURVEY
So far we've had roughly 350 people take the survey. You have until May 24. Don't delay. Visit https://nursing.umaryland.edu/cgi-bin/rws3.pl?FORM=WebsiteRedesignTwo. It shouldn't take more than a few minutes to complete.

PLEASE COMMENT ON OUR SITE'S ARCHITECTURE
It is not too late to give us feedback on our new site's architecture (defined below).

We will be performing usability testing during the beta launch of the new site to make certain the new design is a vast improvement over the older site.

Until then you have the forum (here in the blog) to comment on that architecture. Please do!

Web site architecture is an approach to the design and planning of Web sites involving technical, aesthetic, and functional criteria. The focus is on the user and the user experience, with attention to usability, interaction design, and overall design.

Amazing! What a Response to Our Survey

2009-05-13T14:40:00.007-04:00

Thank you, thank you, thank you for taking our survey!

Visit http://umson.blogspot.com/2009/03/architecture-update-and-card-sorting.html to see what our new architecture will look like. Leave us a comment if you haven't already!

We've had a great response rate. So far we've had well over 300 people take the survey. If you haven't taken it -- you have until May 24. Don't delay. Visit https://nursing.umaryland.edu/cgi-bin/rws3.pl?FORM=WebsiteRedesignTwo. It shouldn't take more than a few minutes to complete.

Help Us Decide on a Homepage Design

2009-05-12T08:44:00.006-04:00

Please take a few moments to take our next Web survey.

We're looking for input on two different design concepts for a new homepage look and feel. Once we decide on a design direction we will begin developing second and third tier pages to complement the homepage selected. Yet we don't want to decide this alone -- we are counting on our community for advice.

The survey will remain open until Sunday, May 24. You can access it at:
https://nursing.umaryland.edu/cgi-bin/rws3.pl?FORM=WebsiteRedesignTwo

Next User Survey Launches Tomorrow!

2009-05-11T08:52:00.006-04:00

We're having a busy day at the School tomorrow.

LMD Agency is formally revealing two homepage concepts to senior staff and the Web advisory board. Soon after that meeting I will be launching a second user survey to get your feedback on these designs.

The homepage designs are largely based on the first user survey, phone interviews, and feedback from past Web advisory board and other meetings with LMD.

Here's a sneak peek at the designs:

More tomorrow!

Schedule Updates

2009-04-13T08:17:00.007-04:00

We've completed a lot of things so far in our redesign: We interviewed a diverse slice of the School's community, got input from the majority of constituents through an online survey, and we worked with our Web advisory board to settle issues around our site architecture.

And now the fun begins!

In the coming days LMD will show us Two Home Page Design Drafts, and we will post these designs online and launch a second online survey to get your input. Once we have your input we'll have an open forum around May 19 to reveal the final designs.

We will have a Beta Launch of the site towards the end of June, with usability testing to take place. Tentatively, we plan to launch the live site (given we adhere to our deadlines and production moves along) by the middle of July.

Stay tuned!

Architecture Update and Card Sorting Workshop

2009-03-26T16:47:00.027-04:00

We had an amazing card sorting workshop yesterday during our web advisory board meeting.

Card sorting is a simple technique in usability design where a group of "users" are guided to generate a category tree or find a way of grouping items into useful bins. It is great approach for designing work-flows, menu structures, or, in this case, Web site navigation paths.

We had an idea, walking to the meeting, about how our architecture might look but we wanted to open up the conversation to our advisory board. We were very happy with the results, and the fact that our board was able to help us come to some good decisions about the overall navigation of the site.

We started by having all content grouped together in unorganized piles on one wall and asks four different groups to organize them in "buckets" along another wall. We also got some feedback as far as renaming some bucket headings. All in all, it was a fun activity, and we all learned something about how users might categorize some of our Web content.

Here's how the exercise went:

Jane, Marjorie, and Karen discuss how they might organize things:

Sandy and Rosemary discuss how to group things too. We broke our board into four groups, and each group had to figure out how to group content together on the opposite wall:

Sue is posting some notes on the wall as Jane consults with Marjorie and Karen across the room:
Once time was up we discussed the choices, and determined if we needed to shift things around -- given audience needs and general organizational ideas:

Here are the results of the board's work:

This is the full architecture: Note that there are three ways to access Web content: through user type (think demographics), task (think quick links), or by subject (our card sorting exercise was based exclusively on the subject-based way of navigating). Click to see a larger image.

Creative Brief Complete. Survey Responses Tallied.

2009-02-27T10:14:00.003-05:00

With the Creative Brief complete, LMD is working on site architecture revisions. Here are the findings of the survey:

TOP-LINE RESEARCH FINDINGS

Public’s Perception of UMSON
Based on the interviews conducted and responses from an online questionnaire, UMSON is perceived as a solid institution among alumni, faculty/staff, and current students. Adjectives such as prestigious, challenging, forward-thinking, and inspiring were utilized to describe the school.

Although most comments were positive, a common reference to some shortcomings came to surface, particularly from the current student group.

Survey participants were asked to verbalize what they believed to be UMSON strengths. Common comments across all groups were related to excellence in education at an affordable price as well as the prestigious faculty and leadership. Valuable research opportunities also were listed as an important characteristic of the school. The fact that UMSON is ranked among the top 10 schools in the country adds an immense level of credibility and pride to be associated with UMSON across all groups.

When participants were asked to mention unique attributes about the school in comparison to other schools of nursing, national ranking, prestigious faculty, geographical location, variety of academic programs, research opportunities, and affordability were the common themes among all participants.

Public’s Perception of Current UMSON Website
Participants were asked to rate the current UMSON website on quality and organization of the information, visual design, and overall usability on a scale of 1-3, with one being excellence and 3 being poor. The average score among ~133 participants was a 2; however, the most improvement was required on the areas of usability, content organization, and visual design. Some comments from the survey include:

"A single calendar that let us know what is happening in the SON and around the campus."
"There are so many items in the drop-down menus. Should be fewer."
"Reorganize links, improve the ease of navigation."
"Update information and check accuracy. It is hard to find needed information."
"Separate intranet and logins for student and faculty users as distinct from public."
"Definitely highlight school ranking."
"Add streaming videos/clips of commentaries about the strength of the programs by successful alumni in various leadership positions across the country/world in various specialties of nursing."
"Make sure the search feature is very robust to cover all of the specialties that the school offers."

About the New Site
Survey participants visit the UMSON site an average of three to four times per week, mainly to access the Blackboard application, share drives, access the faculty and staff directory, and to keep up with relevant school news. A number of students express concern with regard to timely postings.

Participants express interest in having a highly interactive website to help improve overall communication. A few examples include adding online course listings, a centralized calendar of events, improved site search capability, links to commonly used application such as Blackboard, and SURF on the home page to facilitate access.

In addition, participants express the need for a better site architecture in order to decrease repetitiveness of information as well as facilitate site navigation. The implementation of photographs conveying the school dynamics is very important. A few examples included photos of student in clinical and academic settings, shots portraying student life on campus, and faculty student interaction. Other items such as student blogs, streaming video, and social networking were mentioned as tools that could improve communication across campus as well as connect current students and alumni with school initiatives.

Creative Brief Update

2009-02-23T14:05:00.003-05:00

We're putting last minute edits together for the creative brief (based on our survey and interviews), and later this week I will post excerpts from that creative for comment.

Thank you for participating!

2009-02-10T13:20:00.002-05:00

We had 124 people respond to our survey. Results will be posted soon for your commenting.

Survey Wrapping Up Sunday

2009-02-06T18:47:00.003-05:00

Don't forget to participate in the Web survey! I'm taking it down Sunday, and will post survey results shortly.

Don't Forget to Participate!

2009-01-29T09:52:00.005-05:00

We had a very productive week as we continue our information gathering prior to moving into wire-framing and prototyping.

Bilaal, Hector, and Mike from LMD came to the School to visit with the Web Advisory Board (representatives from across the SON community) and to meet with Administrative Council (senior staff). These were dynamic, productive meetings and those who participated were able to engage LMD with questions of audience, brand, and the like.

Our interviews are just about wrapped up as well as our online survey. Don't lose out by not participating in these preliminary questions that will provide a framework for the redesign to move forward.

Visit https://nursing.umaryland.edu/cgi-bin/rws3.pl?FORM=WebsiteRedesign to complete the survey. Your input is very valuable to us! And please distribute the survey link to others who might like to weigh in on the School's site.

Please note: The survey will be up until the beginning of February.

Here is some of LMD's work >>

Web Advisory Board Meeting 1/21/09

2009-01-23T12:35:00.004-05:00

In attendance: Marjorie Fass, Michelle Healy, Jillian Aldebron, Kathryn Montgomery, Deborah Sherman, Karen Clark, Kathy Farnsworth, Karen McQuillan, Gail Doerr, Pat Adams, Bryan Hantman, Enjoli Sonnier, and Christine Ward.

We started with an update on redesign process, the current discovery & information gathering phase, and general timeline for the overall project. As a group, we discussed major outcomes for the redesign and of the SON Web site in general.

In addition, we discussed constituent groups: who is the web for?

We ranked prospective students, alumni, and prospective faculty as the top three groups. Other groups include:

Donors
Current students
Accrediting agencies
High school and college counselors
Media
Boards
Legislators and government officials
Preceptors / faculty associates
Current faculty and staff
Parents and families
Researchers
Professional partners
Peers
Lifelong learners

Web Site Redesign Questionnaire

2009-01-21T12:09:00.005-05:00

Help us! Guide the redesign process by completing this short survey.

Visit https://nursing.umaryland.edu/cgi-bin/rws3.pl?FORM=WebsiteRedesign to complete the survey.

Your input is very valuable to us! And please distribute the survey link to others who might like to weigh in on the School's site.

Please note: The survey will be up until the beginning of February.

Interviews Underway and Advisory Board to Meet

2009-01-21T07:14:00.003-05:00

LMD began interviewing people this week, and that process will continue until the end of January. They are interviewing alumni, current students, members of admin council (senior staff), faculty member, and other staff members. For these interviews, we will have input from the following perspectives and backgrounds:

undergraduate students
global health
graduate students
alumni
part-time faculty at Shady Grove
senior staff and assistant/associate deans
full-time faculty members
researchers
administrative staff
admissions and recruitment

An online survey, asking many of the same questions, will be posted on this blog later this week.

Today the Communications Advisory Board Invitation, helping the office of communications with the decision-making process, is meeting for the first time. This same committee is working on the SON magazine redesign and will also weigh in on the SON e-newsletter.

Those members are:

Jillian Aldebron
Karen Clark
Hershaw Davis (BSN student)
Marjorie Fass
Kathy Farnsworth
Susie Flaherty
Laurette Hankins
Jeffrey Johnson
Jane Kapustin
Karen McQuillan
Kathy Montgomery
Tricia Morton
Deb Sherman
Marisa Wilson
Shady Grove Student (pending)
MS Student (pending)

Faculty & Staff Input Needed

2008-12-17T13:39:00.001-05:00

I am also looking for interested faculty and staff who are willing to discuss our website (pluses and minuses, what works what doesn't, etc). LMD will be conducting phone interviews with select participants shortly after the New Year.

If interested please send email to me (hantman@son.umaryland.edu) with your contact information and best time to reach you.

Student Volunteers Needed to Discuss the Web

2008-12-16T09:01:00.005-05:00

I am looking for a few current students to discuss our website (pluses and minuses, what works what doesn't, etc). LMD will be conducting phone interviews with select participants shortly after the New Year.

If interested please send email to me (hantman@son.umaryland.edu) with your contact information and best time to reach you.

Kick-off & Creative/Technical Briefs

2008-12-15T08:22:00.003-05:00

Today the communications office is visiting the LMD agency to meet with the project staff working on our redesign project. At the meeting we'll begin to develop a scope of work, creative brief, and technical brief.

More to come later...

Glossary of Terms

2008-12-11T07:14:00.002-05:00

For those not familiar with some of the terminology used for discussing the redesign, I've included this list of terms likely to come up in discussions of the web redesign:

Card Sorting:
Card sorting is a simple technique in usability design where a group of subject experts or "users", however inexperienced with design, are guided to generate a category tree. It is a useful approach for web site navigation paths. Card sorting has a characteristically low-tech approach. The concepts are first identified and written onto simple index cards or Post-it notes. The user group then arranges these to represent the groups or structures they are familiar with.

Content Management System:
A content management system (CMS) is a computer application used to create, edit, manage, and publish content in a consistently organized fashion. CMSs are frequently used for storing, controlling, versioning, and publishing. The content managed may include computer files, image media, audio files, video files, electronic documents, and Web content.

Creative Brief/Technical Brief:
A creative brief is a document used by creative professionals and agencies to develop creative deliverables: visual design, copy, advertising, web sites, etc. In this case, a technical brief is included as well to document what technical deliverables are necessary for the redesign.

Cascading Style Sheets:
Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) is a stylesheet language used to describe the presentation of a document written in a markup language. Its most common application is to style web pages written in HTML and XHTML, but the language can be applied to any kind of XML document, including SVG and XUL.

Data Migration:
Data migration is the process of transferring data between storage types, formats, or computer systems. In our case it will be taking teh content from the current website and transferring it to the new. Data migration phases (design, extraction, cleansing, load, verification) for applications of moderate to high complexity are commonly repeated several times before the new system is deployed.

Deployment:
The deployment of a mechanical device, electrical system, computer program, etc., is its assembly or transformation from a packaged form to an operational working state. Deployment implies moving a product from a temporary or development state to a permanent or desired state. In our case it will be the launching of the new website.

Information Architecture:
Information architecture (IA) is the art of expressing a model or concept of information used in activities that require explicit details of complex systems including, a Content Management Systems, web development, user interactions, database development, programming, and software design. Most definitions have common qualities: a structural design of shared environments, methods of organizing and labeling websites, intranets, and online communities, and ways of bringing the principles of design and architecture to the digital landscape.

Needs Assessment:
Needs assessment provides a method of assessing the total needs of a community of people: of that community, for that community and by that community. In this case, it is a website.

Open Source:
Open source is a development methodology, which offers practical accessibility to a product's source (goods and knowledge). Some consider open source as one of various possible design approaches, while others consider it a critical strategic element of their operations. Before open source became widely adopted, developers and producers used a variety of phrases to describe the concept; the term open source gained popularity with the rise of the Internet, which provided access to diverse production models, communication paths, and interactive communities.

Personas:
Personas are fictitious characters created to represent the different user types within a targeted demographic that might use a site or product. Personas are useful in considering the goals, desires, and limitations of the users in order to help to guide decisions about a product, such as features, interactions, and visual design. Personas are most often used as part of a user-centered design process for designing software and are also considered a part of interaction design (IxD).

URI:
In computing, a Uniform Resource Identifier (URI) is a compact string of characters used to identify or name a resource on the Internet. The main purpose of this identification is to enable interaction with representations of the resource over a network, typically the World Wide Web, using specific protocols. URIs are defined in schemes defining a specific syntax and associated protocols.

Usability Testing:
Usability testing is a technique used to evaluate a product by testing it on users. This can be seen as an irreplaceable usability practice, since it gives direct input on how real users use the system.

Web 2.0:
Web 2.0 is the term to describe a second generation of the Web, where the Web is more dynamic as users generate and share content. Web 2.0 basically refers to the transition from static HTML Web pages to a more dynamic Web that is more organized and is based on serving Web applications to users. Blogs, wikis, and Web services are all seen as components of Web 2.0.

Web Development:
Web development is a broad term for any activity related to developing a web site for the World Wide Web or an intranet. This can include e-commerce business development, web design, web content development, client-side/server-side scripting, and web server configuration.

Web Hosting:
A web hosting service is a type of Internet hosting service that allows individuals and organizations to provide their own website accessible via the World Wide Web. Web hosts are companies that provide space on a server they own for use by their clients as well as providing Internet connectivity, typically in a data center. Web hosts can also provide data center space and connectivity to the Internet for servers they do not own to be located in their data center, called a co-location.

XHTML:
The Extensible Hypertext Markup Language, or XHTML, is a markup language that has the same depth of expression as HTML, but also conforms to XML syntax.

Your Input is Needed!

2008-12-09T15:13:00.000-05:00

Over the next 5-6 months I will work with LMD (see post below for info on LMD) to design, develop, implement the first phase of our redesign efforts. And I need your help!

This blogging framework will be used to get SON community input. I will post screenshots, surveys, alpha and beta versions of the new site in progress for comment and evaluation.

Soon we will kick-off the project with information gathering and the development of a creative and technical brief.

In the 5-6 weeks after that initial meeting LMD will conduct phone interviews with nine (9) stakeholders, develop a new site architecture, assist in some technical selections including: the best CMS, Web site host, and other items that come from our needs assessment.

Look for another update during that time.

UMSON Chooses Company for Redesign

2008-12-09T14:30:00.001-05:00

The Office of Communications has selected the LMD Agency (http://www.lmdagency.com/) to work with the School on its redesign efforts and migration to Content Management System (CMS).

Choosing LMD was an arduous process -- we evaluated nine submissions from various companies. Yet we are please that LMD won the bid. They redesigned UM College Park's website (http://www.umd.edu/), they have designed other UMS (system) sites. LMD knows nurses too. They worked on an integrated marketing campaign for the American Nurses Credentialing Center Association.