It's striking, inviting, and easy to use

Daniel Webster College introduces new website to community

April 19, 2004 - There is a whole lot of "orange" going on at Daniel Webster College as it recently rolled out a new website, www.dwc.edu to the community and Internet public.

"Wow," said DWC senior Amelia Richardson when she first viewed the college's new website.  "This looks cool."  Richardson also noted that in addition to being "bright and inviting," the site is manageable and easy to use; "everything I needed was right there."

Taking a cue from the college's colorful new undergraduate marketing collateral -- bright orange large mailing envelopes, an oversized orange "view book" and blue "search piece," and postcard campaigns -- the new website was designed by DWC alumnus and Nashua resident Ryan Keough, 01, to bring a cohesiveness to an institution that serves numerous constituencies including traditional undergraduate students, its adult evening students, as well as alumni, prospective students, friends and trustees of the college, and the general public.

Because approximately half of DWC's students are enrolled in distance education or evening programs at both the college's Nashua and Portsmouth campuses, it was especially important that the ease of use apply to the non-traditional students as well.

"Adult students have so many demands on their time, it is important that they're provided with the necessary tools to efficiently manage their course work.  This is especially true of our distance educations students -- the website is the "classroom" for them and they can access that classroom any time, any day, from anywhere in the world," said director of distance education Kim Byrne.

Other steady users include the college's 3,500 alumni.  Alumni Council chair Daren Hudson, '88, said, "Through hard work and the efforts of the IT department, a wonderful staff, and concerned alumni/ae, the new www.dwc.edu site is a fantastic resource for students and alumni.  To expand it, promote it, and use it are high priorities for the Alumni Council; our goal is for every alumnus/a to have it bookmarked.  Links on the alumni portion of the site include our new Alumni Forum, which is providing great networking avenues for all users, including up-to-date industry news, job postings and other 'insider information' for DWC students and graduates."

Perhaps the most activity the website sees is from the prospective student and his or her family.  According to Director of Admissions Sean Ryan "Nearly 100 percent of the students and families who contact our office have checked us out first on the Internet.  With so many college and university sites available on-line, a website has to quickly and easily provide the information that is of most importance to our people -- and their parents --using the least amount of clicks."

But the website would not be fulfilling its job if it didn't "work" for the students, faculty and staff already enrolled or employed at DWC.  It was important, therefore, that current students have "one-click" access to the areas that are important to them, like being able to check schedules or grades, use on-line campus directories, access the library's numerous data bases and research guides, or check out upcoming campus events.

Said Library Director Francesca Denton, on one hand the 'look' of the website is more eye-catching and colorful, yet on the other hand our library content is comfortable and the information access is familiar.  It's the best of both worlds!"