New website in development
The University of Indianapolis’ public website is being renovated and redesigned in preparation for a launch later this spring.
Mary Atteberry, executive director of communications and marketing, has been overseeing its development since its inception in February 2010. According to her, although the official initiative did not begin until last year, the redesign has been planned for several years.
“It was very apparent to us that the website was outdated, and there were some navigation issues,” Atteberry said. “The information was not as available to prospective students as it should be.”
Other areas in the UIndy infrastructure recognized the need for a redesign.
“We saw a growing need for additional work on the site to meet the needs of students,” said Ron Wilks, director of admissions.
Rare Bird Inc., a Web company in Indianapolis, was selected in January 2011 to head the redesign.
According to Wilks, the Office of Admissions also has helped the initiative by organizing information. Wilks said that the biggest enhancement on the new site is the ease of scheduling a campus visit online.
“Before the new site, the form was much longer and not as user-friendly,” Wilks said. “We improved this to make it easier and provide clearer confirmation information.”
According to Wilks, the new site will also help Admissions to better control how many people may sign up to visit at a given time.
Students have been able to test the new site, which was made available through an email from Atteberry.
Sophomore biochemistry major Steffen Good said he likes the original web page because it has many resources and the list of library databases, but there are things he feels could be improved.
“My biggest complaint is the Zimbra mini,” Good said. “If it gets too long, it doesn’t scroll down so you can see what you’re typing.”
Good added that he would like to see ACE incorporated into MyUIndy the way Zimbra is now. However, Good said that he likes the current site as a whole.
“It’s pretty user-friendly because it’s pretty straightforward,” Good said. “They have all their links on the site, and it’s got tabs so you can play with that. I feel like it directs you pretty well.”
While the entire site has not been re-done, the home page and many current section pages have been redesigned on the beta site. Other pages that do not receive as much traffic will remain as they are.
“We didn’t redo the entire site,” Atteberry said. “If you look through the new site at various points, you’ll go back to the current website. The university’s website has hundreds and hundreds of pages.”
Several tabs and sections have been created on the site, including Majors, Campus Life and Athletics. Atteberry said that the section for campus life was created because it is important for prospective students to know what they can expect on campus.
“What we have discovered through research is that students looking for colleges really rely heavily on websites,” Atteberry said. “And if they can’t find the information they need, they’ll be less interested in you as an institution.”
The goal of the redesign was to make a large volume of information readily available between one and three clicks. According to Atteberry, any information considered hard to find was presented in a format easier to understand.
“We felt that we needed to get a site that was a lot more user-friendly, a lot more intuitive for prospective students to find the information they needed,” Atteberry said.
The new UIndy website is expected to launch on May 14.
