With the rapid growth of the digital environment, a difficult task facing many organizations is to consolidate information that is currently spread far and wide so that users do not have to jump from place to place to get a complete picture. Dartmouth Now is one such effort, sponsored by Dartmouth’s Office of Public Affairs.
Before Dartmouth Now, the Office of Public Affairs (OPA) had multiple vehicles for getting the word out about Dartmouth, both in print and online. While leading a College-wide initiative to reduce print publications, OPA took the opportunity to develop a consolidated digital publication for Dartmouth stories. Dartmouth Now is Dartmouth’s primary information destination for current activities and initiatives.
My role in Dartmouth Now was primarily strategic. As project manager, I worked with OPA and Web Services colleagues to develop a project charter and timeline for the website, and to keep the project moving.
But I also had the opportunity to work with code. One of the project requirements was a software platform that would support comments, tagging, easy updating, and an approval workflow. We decided to use WordPress as the development platform. This was Web Services’ first foray into using WordPress. I joined the team in tinkering with the templates and CSS to help accomplish the design and functionality.
In addition, Dartmouth Now offers email updates via MailChimp. I designed the email template using MailChimp’s RSS-to-Email feature. Updates are automatically generated from Dartmouth Now’s RSS feed and sent to subscribers daily or weekly, depending on their preference.
- Launch: March 2010
- Role: Plan, Build
- Key Collaborators: Office of Public Affairs, Web Services
- URL: http://now.dartmouth.edu
Sarah Horton 