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BY ROSARIO PAZ

In print | Published March 29, 2007

Prospective students will no longer be disputing the existence of student life at Swarthmore. The new Student Life Web site is set to become another branch of the college homepage, with revamped and personalized sub-sites of the various offices and departments on campus. Several sections of the Web site will be launched early next week.

“The Communications Office is working very closely with the Deans Office and IT and a wonderful team of student contributors to develop the content and the redesign of the student life site,” Nancy Nicely, director of communications in the Office of News and Information, said. “That includes each of the sub-sites as well as the homepage design itself. Each of the redesigned sub-sites, which will include student testimonials, will be housed within the larger framework of a student life Web site. There will be easy links to them from the student life page,” Nicely said.

ITS, the Deans’ Office and the Office of News and Information have been collaborating to provide a Student Life section since the main college Web site was redesigned. “We were really excited about the way the new college homepage looked, but it didn’t seem like it reflected campus life to not have campus life be included in that list of major category of activities,” Coordinator of Residential Life Liz Derickson ’01 said.

The introduction of the Student Life Web site will begin with the update of the individual sub-sites of the many offices on campus.

“What makes up that student life area are a lot of little sites for different areas and departments,” Kelly Mueller, Manager of Web Projects at ITS, said. “This is all towards getting an umbrella site. We’re going from the bottom up.” Sub-sites with a planned launch taking place early next week include Housing, Pre-Law Advising, Pre-Med Advising, Academic Advising and Support, the Deans’ Office, Student Employment Office and Religious and Spiritual Advice.

In between the initial launch and the week of April 9, updates of additional sub-sites should mark the end of the first phase. These sub-sites include Psychological Services, Multicultural Affairs, Gender Education and the Health Center.

On April 9 the inclusion of two more new sections will mark the second phase of the college’s Web site redesign.

“There’s two broad sections that we’ll be launching the week of April 9: Student Activities and Getting Around,” Nicely said. The former will include student clubs and organizations, SAC, perspectives on the college’s party system and social scene and related issues. The latter will be an updated combination of the Transportation and Getting Off Campus Web sites that currently exist, complete with content derived from students.

The look and navigation of the Student Life Web site and the smaller sub-sites will maintain uniformity, but retain the unique elements of each department or area of information. This is accomplished through a content management system, which provides easy navigation for browsers and simple site management for those who maintain the Web sites.

“Our sites are developed based on templates — the good thing about that is that if you are a user, you find the menus in the same place and the contact info in the same place,” Mueller said. “At the same time, we wouldn’t want the Web sites to look the same. There’s a lot of variety on the sites based on the images and we’re always trying to use personal voices when we can.”

The final phase of the Student Life Web site will be marked by the launching of the Web site tab on the college homepage, alongside Administration, Admissions and other currently prioritized links. “Ultimately, at the tail end of April or early May we will be launching the new homepage design, which will be the site that umbrellas over all of this information and all of these terrific student testimonials,” Nicely said.

The final launch will tie in with the implementation of the first phase next week, as it will be the hub of the many sub-sites currently under reconstruction for the first two phases.

According to Mueller, the Web site will provide “an umbrella view of student life and let you navigate easily to the groups and departments that you’re interested in.”

The information that will be provided on the Student Life Web page will offer prospective students the chance to learn about the personal experiences of students at the college as much as one can over the Internet on a college-sponsored page. It will also provide current students with the essential information they will need at various times of the school year, including information about the housing lottery, how to host parties, and the transportation options available to and from Philadelphia.

According to Derickson, the Web site will represent students not just as “scholars” or “athletes” but will show that there “are all sorts of levels of support and activity on the campus to share. I think the point of the site is to both share and celebrate the centrality of the student life component of the Swarthmore student experience.”

“One of the things that I think will be particularly appealing about the site is that you will see and hear and read student voices,” Nicely said. “There will be a real student presence on the page.”

The launch is not a finalization of the project, but an initial push at developing a personal image of student life on campus. The deans’ office will ask for more student input for the testimonials planned for the Web site that may pertain to any of the various categories of college life, including Residential Life, the Health Center and Academic Support.

“I will offer as much to students as they want to do or are willing to do [in] orchestrating and coming up with ideas,” Derickson said.

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