Helping prospective graduate students find information about MSU

1. Helping prospective graduate students find information about MSU Jim Green Academic Computing and Network Services Chair, MSU Web Team Christina Tower University Relations July 19, 2006

2. This meeting’s purpose • Review the current situation and recent developments • Gather information from stakeholders and interested parties • Begin a dialog process toward determining the best course of action • Decide on the next steps

3. MSU Web Team • MSU Web Team • Joint UR/LC&T team • oversees www.msu.edu • content, design, and infrastructure • with direction from upper management • advises and assists departments with their web initiatives • facilitate web design that will fit in with official MSU web sites

4. Background • 2003 www.msu.edu redesign project: • “graduate portal” as a follow-on project • “prospective students” is top target audience • information architecture – findability – is the top design priority • 2006 www.msu.edu redesign • 2006 admissions.msu.edu redesign • 2006-2007 search.msu.edu redesign • May 15 meeting with Janet and Les

5. Basic tasks • find program information • degrees • majors/minors • fields/areas of study • interdisciplinary programs • apply online • special program/dept. procedures • find research and teaching opportunites • assistantships • learn about and apply for financial aid • find information about the MSU and EL communities

6. Current situation • multiple “front doors” -- institutional • grad.msu.edu (Graduate School) • admissions.msu.edu/beaspartan.com (Admissions) • www.vprgs.msu.edu (VP for Research and Graduate Studies) • www.msu.edu/future/index.html (MSU’s main web site) • http://csp.msu.edu/pages/explore/grdintro.cfm (Career Services & Placement) • and at the college level • www.ns.msu.edu/pstudents/index.php (College of Nat. Sci.) • http://www.cal.msu.edu/portals/ProspectiveStudents.htm (Arts & Letters) • http://cas.msu.edu/prospectivestudents.php (CAS) • http://web4.canr.msu.edu/canrhome/display_page.asp?topic=Graduate&theme=Prospective%20Students&pagename=Department%20Links (College of Ag.)

9. Case Study – program information • Multiple lists of programs/majors • Registrar Academic Programs and Descriptions of Courses • Admissions – majors list • MSU web site academic programs list • Graduate School colleges and programs list

10. Potential issues • Decentralization presents problems for users • Information overlaps and gaps • Programs, degrees, majors, minors, fields of study • Multiple places to look for information • Never sure you’ve seen all that’s available • Lack of uniformity in how information is arranged • Need to search/browse across all sources of info • searchers vs. browsers • PDF format is a barrier

11. Examples from other institutions • Cornell • no keyword search, but drop-down combined with tabbed info display are fairly effective • Minnesota • A to Z majors – searchable • multiple lists and catalogs • Ohio State • Separate programs and fields of study lists • Programs – searchable; Fields of Study is A to Z only

18. Possible courses of action • Do nothing • Minor adjustments to existing resources • Further investigation • meetings, brainstorming • focus groups, usability studies • Smaller, targeted projects • programs/fields database/search • “Be a Spartan” for grads? • … • Larger graduate resources web design project • where would this fit?

19. Further information • Jim Green, Coordinator, Academic Systems • Academic Computing and Network Svcs. • jfgreen@msu.edu • 432-7239 • PowerPoint and handout:http://www.msu.edu/~jfgreen/presentations