With that in mind, it was the right time to take the site to the next level. "Our goal was to develop a cohesive presence that provided consistent information in a dynamic Web environment, since the Web may well be the first, last, and single continuous face and voice of the institution," said Lisa Petrides, Chair of the TC Web Advisory Group and Assistant Professor of Management Systems. "We strove to maintain a graphically appealing, functionally designed, and thoughtfully implemented site, which required a collaborative cross-college effort on the part of faculty, staff, and computing services." The basis for the design of the new site was developed by Lipman Hearne, a Web design company located in Chicago.

Located at the top of the new home page design is a black navigation bar that also resides on all secondary level pages. Within the blue area in the center of the page is an image to give viewers a better visual perception of the TC community. The image rotates a new picture each time the page is loaded. To the right of the screen are the primary site categories. The majority of the secondary level pages also have a new look with a consistent design and navigational structure. Below are a few examples of secondary sites that have been redesigned and reorganized.

"Academic Departments" has been restructured to make finding information more intuitive and quicker. The department names are listed to the right, and when the mouse is placed over the images, academic programs within that department pop up to the left. When each department image is clicked on, the viewer is taken to another level to find out more program information either via accessing the official catalog online or by continuing on to that department's individual Web site.

"Research and Service," "Publications," "Student Resources" and "Faculty and Staff Resources" are set up similarly to the Academic Department site mentioned above, and also consist of right-hand navigational images with mouse roll-overs. When the mouse rolls over the images, text-which describes that particular item and what can be found on that item's Web site-appears to the left. This feature brings the information up front and eliminates the need for users to wade through several site levels before getting to what they need.

Check out the new TC Web site at http://www.teacherscollege.edu

Published Tuesday, Sep. 18, 2001