The Educational Outreach Web sites (opens new window) consist of promoting classes and services we offer outside of main campus (downtown Detroit). The sites went through a name chance and an identity overhaul. The site is broken down into counties and extension centers. In total you can take Wayne State University (opens new window) classes in 4 counties at currently 7 extension centers. Each extension center has their own course listing and services, we broke the site up by location.

The Big Changes

We added a global navigation to glue all the sites together. This global navigation is crucial for prospective students who come into this site as their "homepage" or first interaction with Wayne State. These links are the core tasks for the university so the extension centers don't seem so disconnected from main campus.

Courses at each center are now pulled in from the class schedule. This is important because it gives the user personalization and context to what they are looking for. It doesn't just dump them off on another site with a whole new navigation to learn.

Breadcrumbs orient the user if they come in from a link or search engine. Personally I am not a fan of breadcrumbs but because it is not obvious to realize where each extension center is located.

The Small Changes

Most of the small changes happened behind the scenes come from the positioning of the extension centers from in the past completely separate entities to now options to take classes off main campus and possibly closer to home. The branding of the centers has also been updated to the most recent campaign of Aim Higher (opens new window). The photos throughout the site are packed with students and faculty instead of buildings.

Checkout the site at: http://educationaloutreach.wayne.edu/ (opens new window)