Valparaiso University Website Governance

The primary audience for Valparaiso University’s website is prospective students. The homepage and sites within the global navigation are primarily intended to illustrate to potential students what makes Valparaiso University unique and encourage enrollment.

Secondary audiences include current students, alumni, prospective donors, faculty, and staff. Tertiary audiences include prospective employees, media outlets, community partners, and the general public.

For every page, it is essential to consider who the primary audience is and what key message or action is most relevant for that audience.

All Valparaiso University web initiatives are guided by these three principles:

Our visitors come first.

Content should be developed and designed in a way that prioritizes the user experience, not the institutional structure.

Consistency is key.

All webpages should maintain consistency in brand messaging and design, and pages with similar goals should strive for consistency in structure and calls to action (e.g., academic program pages should include the same information such as curriculum, program highlights, and alumni testimonials regardless of the department or college in which the program is housed).

Our site is not static and finished.

The website should be able to evolve as the market or the University changes. We are committed to continuous improvement, using data-informed analysis, best practices and experimentation to achieve our goals.

The website valpo.edu and all of its subdomains are the property of Valparaiso University. Faculty and staff will have access to edit relevant portions of the site, create and remove content, and maintain subject-area accuracy.

Responsibility for the valpo.edu website and its subdomains falls under the management and supervision of University Marketing to maintain a cohesive user-centered focus and consistent branding. University Marketing will be involved in and have decision-making authority over the function, presentation, and accessibility/compliance for all branded sites as well as integrated web features and services.

Valparaiso University’s approved content management and customer relationship management systems and brand architecture will be used to develop any new page within the valpo.edu website. No software products, plug-ins, services, or embedded scripts will be deployed on the Valparaiso University website without the consultation, approval, and oversight of University Marketing.

Official Valparaiso University resources, programs, and services must be hosted in the valpo.edu framework or via approved, linked vendors. As part of the academic process, faculty or students may seek to create and host content outside the valpo.edu framework, on independent “third-party” sites. Individuals or groups looking to establish a third-party site must consult with University Marketing to discuss trademark and branding implications as well as deprecation planning. The University Marketing team is only able to support pages within the valpo.edu framework.

Marketing Leadership

Vice President of Enrollment and Marketing
Executive Director of Marketing
Director of Paid and Digital Media

Responsibilities/charge:

• Broad oversight for the strategic direction of valpo.edu.
• Final arbitrator for decisions regarding website governance and standards. Decision by consensus, with the vice president as mediator.

University Marketing Team

Primary strategic direction and support for valpo.edu and associated sites and assets is led by University Marketing, working closely with University Communications and Information Technology Services.

The Director of Web Services and Content

Provides oversight, reviews requests from academic and administrative stakeholders and sets priorities, and informs marketing leadership of strategic-level projects and plans.

Additional responsibilities of the marketing team include:

• Setting web content direction based on best practices and the needs of web visitors
• Ensuring site quality and content integrity as well as compliance with all legal and regulatory standards, including accessibility, security, and privacy
• Providing training and support to editors for use of the content management system, website best practices, and ADA compliance/accessibility
• Maintaining the software in an up-to-date manner
• Researching, evaluating, and sharing best practices, industry trends, and web analytics reporting
• Primary support for valpo.edu and associated sites and assets. This includes:
  • Updating site structure and navigation, including the creation of new pages. To promote a streamlined site map and a positive user experience, creating new pages will be an exclusive responsibility of the University Marketing web team.
  • Evaluating and executing requests to develop new features and templates, including changes to structure, look and feel, navigation, styling, etc.
• University Marketing has access to all areas of the Valparaiso University website and, to ensure quality control, will edit/alter content as needed to promote effective web communications. Changes can be made for clarity, grammar, spelling, usage, website best practices, accessibility compliance and style, as well as to conform to University naming conventions and branding.
• University Marketing reserves the right to revise or delete content housed either on University IT resources or external resources if it is found that the content does not meet acceptable use guidelines or the standards outlined here.

Information Technology Services

Information Technology Services acts as caretaker for the web-server operations of the CMS (WordPress), providing server setup, maintenance, and troubleshooting. Responsible for the installation of the core CMS software and databases, they also identify and implement server-optimization opportunities and are charged with server-level security. CMS theme and associated items are considered design elements and not in the scope of IT’s responsibilities.

Information Technology Services shall:

• Administer and maintain the web infrastructure, including the web and database servers.
• Install, maintain, and upgrade additional web and database servers as needed.
• Assist University Marketing in selecting, installing, and maintaining CMS add-ons, extensions, and plug-ins.
• Assist in reviewing site add-ons, extensions, and plug-ins for security and accessibility issues.
• Maintain and upgrade any necessary non-CMS web server software (for example: Apache, PHP).

Vice Presidents, Deans, and Directors

Responsible for:

• Guiding the overall strategic direction and content creation for departmental websites.
• Identifying a primary and secondary editor for their department.
• Requesting permission changes for editors (both granting and terminating access).
• Ensuring editors complete and remain up to date with web training provided by University Marketing.

Primary Editor

Primary editors are responsible for the day-to-day maintenance of their assigned websites.

Their responsibilities are:

• Ensuring all content, including text, photo, videos and PDFs, whether posted themselves or with the assistance of other editors, is in accordance with the governance guidelines and ADA compliance/web accessibility.
• Editing/updating copy on existing pages and posting news and events updates at the direction of, or in collaboration with, the department chair.
• Completing and remaining up to date on web training provided by University Marketing.
• Conducting regular (minimum every six months) reviews of site content to remove/refresh outdated content. This includes updating promotional material, recapping events after they occur and ensuring all links connect to “live” pages.
• Sharing ideas, requests, problems and concerns with University Marketing throughout the year
• You can see a workflow for website edit workflows in the appendix.
• Each site must have a year-round staff member (full time) identified and trained as the primary editor and may add secondary editors who also must be trained. Student workers, whether undergraduate or graduate, may support the primary editor after they have completed web training offered by University Marketing. Students may make regular, day-to-day content changes under the supervision of the primary editor.
• Due to the brand responsibilities and training associated with using the CMS properly, each non-academic site should have just one primary and one secondary web editor. Academic units can add a third “support” editor.

All content on the Valparaiso University website must adhere to approved web and editorial guidelines. University Marketing has full access to all areas of all areas of the valpo.edu website and has broad authority to oversee, edit, and remove content that does not comply with guidelines.

The Valparaiso University website, in keeping with best practices for writing for the web, embraces a conversational writing style.

Web visitors are task oriented. They skim and scan, getting just enough information to get to their next destination. Long blocks of text are not easy to absorb online. Headings, bulleted and numbered lists, and images/video are effective tools for organizing website content.

To convey a clear and consistent message, it is critical for all parts of the site to use the university’s official logos and the University naming conventions and style outlined in the style guide.

Official Valparaiso University branding is the only visual identity system that may be adopted for any valpo.edu site. No one may alter the existing Valparaiso University logos and branding, and in no cases may individuals outside of University Marketing create their own unit logos. No exceptions. The University has the full legal right and obligation to protect its materials and ensure compliance with University brand guidelines.

Valparaiso University’s homepage is a branded resource that centers the needs of prospective students and initiatives that advance the University’s brand and strategic priorities. University Marketing is the designated authority for choosing and maintaining content on the homepage.

For faculty and staff members in key public-facing roles, a comprehensive biography reinforces the University brand, supporting engagement from prospective students, professional peers, or members of the media. In most cases, web bios should be no more than 300 words.

Bios are recommended for:

• Faculty
• Senior Leadership
• Admission Counselors
• Advisors
• Division/Department Heads with a Prominent Public-Facing Role

Photos

Photography that meets a high professional standard plays an important role in creating a positive image of Valparaiso University. When posting photos on the site, use photography that captures the authentic interactions among students and among students and faculty. It is important to show a range of genders, ethnic backgrounds, races, ages, etc. Please keep photos under 50 KB to allow for quicker page load times.

University Marketing has authority to ensure that images, photos, and graphics comply with Valparaiso University brand standards, are of the best quality, and represent the professional image of the university.

Faculty/Staff Portraits

Faculty and staff members with an up-to-date University-produced portrait are encouraged to use this photo to promote high standards and a consistent brand experience for website users. If a university-produced portrait is not available, please use this form to sign up for an upcoming portrait session.

Alt Text

Alternative (Alt) Text is required for all non-decorative images on the website. Meant to convey the “why” of the image as it relates to the content of a document or webpage, alt text is read aloud to users by screen reader software and is indexed by search engines. It also displays on the page if the image fails to load. Best practices include:

• Keep it short and descriptive.
• Don’t include “image of” or “photo of”.
• Leave alt text blank if the image is purely decorative
• Alt text for icons should be the equivalent to the information intended by the icon, such as “Download PDF” or “Visit our Facebook Page”

Video

Videos are an important component of telling the Valparaiso University story. Like other materials, they need to adhere to University brand standards and be consistent in style, tone, and message.

All videos posted on the Valpo website must be captioned and ADA compliant. This applies to videos previously produced and videos independently produced. Various software tools and services are available for captioning. Any costs incurred will be the responsibility of the office/department/center in charge of the video. Any video that is not captioned will be removed from the site.

Social Media

Social media is an effective way to engage with your audiences. Where applicable on certain pages, departments and organizations may link to their university-specific social media channels.

All social media platforms referenced on the website must adhere to University social media guidelines [LINK TO POLICY WHEN COMPLETE]. Non-compliant social channels will be removed entirely or replaced with references to the general University channels.

PDFs

As a best practice, content on the Valparaiso University website should be created as website content to support a positive user experience and meet accessibility requirements.

There are some instances when it may be more suitable to upload a PDF to the website instead of recreating content as website content. These include:

• Documents with layout elements that cannot be created using web templates (footnotes/sidenotes/endnotes)
• Custom forms with complex interactive fields that can’t be created with existing services
• Scans of historical documents
• Documents custom-designed for print publication
• Documents in need of annotation and collaboration through a PDF reader
• Mathematical documents
• Legally restricted formats (such as U.S. tax forms)
• Documents with multiple columns, figures, or illustrations
• Documents longer than 20 pages

PDFs on the website must be accessible documents; non-accessible PDFs will be removed. University Marketing has final authority regarding appropriate document formats.

WordPress training must be completed before anyone is granted access to a Valparaiso University website. It is the editor’s responsibility to remain up to date on changes to the workflow process and to complete additional training as needed.

University Marketing is responsible for leading the initial training along with providing follow-up training as new tools or web design structures are developed. It is the trainee’s responsibility to absorb the material, to practice what they learn, and to use the training and style documents that are provided as well as the other resources.

Requests for general assistance for your site must be submitted through the web request form. Please allow one to two business days for a response, and at least five business days for turnaround. Any requests submitted directly to a member of the University Marketing team will be directed to the web request form.

Emergency Requests

In the case of a web emergency (e.g., the site is down or a prominent page on the site is producing a 404 error), please send an email to webmaster@valpo.edu.

Major Projects and Initiatives

Major projects, such as site redesigns, significant content changes, new page creation, and new site launches must be completed in partnership with University Marketing. Your request will be reviewed by University Marketing according to department and strategic priorities. To initiate major projects, please submit the web request form.

A note on outsourced work: Even though some departments may be able to make financial investments for web work on their behalf, all requests for proposals for website work must be approved by University Marketing.

Web Request Workflow Diagram