A reminder of the aims of the WIPII project and the five phase delivery approach were presented
WIPII has completed seven faculty and school workshops, and the next steps are functional workshops which will be open to staff across all faculties and schools
Some analysis work is currently underway on how to improve staff profiles
Other scope areas are still being explored, covering postgraduate, research centres and student information
Subjects - taxonomy
Paul Seiler
The current focus in this area is subjects, with the initial structure of Subjects > Programmes > Courses
Charles enquired how majors and subjects are related
Subjects were described as disciplines for marketing/recruitment
Majors are more an academic construct for study
There is a large number of subjects (120+), and the number varies from which source you review
Kristina noted that the calendar should be definitive subject list, with specialisations within this
To understand whether future students can understand the groupings, they have been asked via Careers Advisors to complete an exercise sorting subjects into categories
Future student version includes 40 subjects
Staff version includes 120 subjects
A newly proposed structure of Topic > Subject > Programme > Course is being proposed
Charles noted this could be an opportunity to present UG and PG programmes in those areas
It was noted that having related subjects to improve search would help draw out the related disciplines
The group fed back the topic example catered for undergraduate audiences well, but some content may not be of interest to international and postgraduates
Kristina noted that the owners of the content for subjects should be retained within the faculties, and that some subjects were owned across faculties
Ownership needs to be clear
Multiple authors of subject pages can make content and tone inconsistent
It was discussed whether the term topic would confuse students alongside the other academic terms, and whether it could be an internal reference and hidden externally
Adrienne noted some programmes were not associated with subjects, such as the MBA
Paul confirmed these are currently defined as subjects on the web, and further consideration would be required on how to represent these
Additional information around distance learning, quality of teaching, rankings etc were also discussed and where these would most appropriately fit
Subjects - template
Anne Nelson
The subject page purpose and target audiences were presented
It was raised whether our current subject pages provide what is required on all areas of consideration and are they focussed on the audience needs
The future state for subjects were put forward, with an improved emphasis on the audience, careers and using plain language
There were suggestions to improve design by including more opportunities for video, visuals, infographics
External examples of content and layout were reviewed for comparison
The Victoria topic page example which had be circulated pre-meeting, was referenced with the following questions:
Will this approach be more effective than the current subject pages?
What flow-on effects would it have – eg: subject paras have been rewritten: should we change how we write in GUS?
Who would be the ‘owner’ of the page? Who might manage the content?
