UNCW Web Site Gets New Design, "House" Logo to Stay
2/10/2006 11:00:33 AM
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Wilmington, N.C. - University of North Carolina Wilmington unveiled a new design for its Web site, www.uncw.edu, this week. UNCW Webmaster Michel Fougeres has been working with University Relations and the Atlanta-based marketing firm Mindpower to develop the new design and navigation. In addition to the university homepage, admissions and the community and visitors pages are part of this new design. The University Relations staff will work with various areas of the campus community to incorporate the new look in all other departments in the near future, with the primary focus on pages of interest to external audiences.
The university's homepage has been long overdue for a redesign, Mimi Cunningham, assistant to the chancellor for university relations, noted. "UNCW hasn't been taking advantage of the tremendous number of opportunities a well-designed Web site provides."
Among the new features of the redesigned Web site is the "Soaring Seahawk," which features vignettes of notable faculty, staff, students, alumni and friends of the university. Eventually, the site will accept nominations for people to feature as "Soaring Seahawks."
The new Web site has also included the traditional "house" logo as part of the new design. After reviewing information from last fall's survey of faculty, staff, students, and alumni regarding the proposed "make waves" slogan and logo, the university decided to keep the current logo as the UNCW mark.
Thanks to the work of Mindpower and the positive feedback from various focus groups, the university may continue to use the wave as a graphic element in some communications, such as admissions and the new Web site.
Seaport, an internal site, will serve as the university portal for internal information, and the goal is to give all faculty, staff and students access to Seaport by late summer. This will allow www.uncw.edu to focus more on external audiences, such as prospective students, alumni and the community.
Enhanced programming will make the pages more accessible on various devices. In addition, the site will also give visitors the ability to stay on top of the latest university news and events through RSS (Really Simple Syndication) news feeds. Initially this free subscription service will be provided for press releases generated by the Office of University Relations and for Randall Library programs and events. Eventually, athletics and campus activities news and events will be included, among others.
Cunningham added that podcasts and vodcasts are features that will be added to the site as a way to reach "technologically savvy" prospective students. As we shift to using the Web as a marketing tool, we have to change the way we present information," said Cunningham.
Assisting with content for the new site are Molly Castagno, part-time Web marketing specialist, and Michelle Manning, part-time English faculty member. Jamie Moncrief, coordinator of photographic services, adds photographs and captions.
Please direct any questions or comments to UNCWrelations@uncw.edu.
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