Mixed reactions to U. Web site

Penn's home page has a new look and the familiar www.upenn.edu isn't quite so familiar anymore.

And as returning students begin to adjust to the new page, campus sentiments toward the site vary.

The decision to update the University's homepage was undertaken after extensive feedback from a Web advisory council that included both current and prospective students, faculty members and guidance counselors. The redesign took effect late last month.

Robin Beck, deputy vice president and interim head of Information Services and Computing, saw the project as a collaborative one.

"It was a consultation with a lot of people who had a lot of say," Beck said. "Everyone came together to make this happen."

The reason for the abundance of consultation stemmed from the guiding principles behind the entire updating process.

University Communications Web and Publishing Services Manager Deni Kasrel said that the new Web site is targeted for a more external audience.

"We wanted to provide a window into the school," Kasrel said. "We targeted the new Penn home page to a prospective audience of students."

The University surveyed many prospective students about what they would look for in a college Web site. The overwhelming response was that they wanted a sense of what it is like to attend Penn. Those ideas led officials to focus more on changing the site's aesthetics in addition to some of its content.

The previous home page had not been updated since 1997, which was also a reason for the overhaul.

"That is forever in Internet years," Kasrel said. "We wanted a more coherent presentation of the University as a whole."

The site is expected to draw more attention to Penn's campus, particularly highlighting its urban appeal. It will include many more pictures, specifically a new background shot of the University which will change seasonally.

"We wanted to focus the purpose of the Web page so that it was vibrant and exciting for people coming and looking," Executive Director of Data Administration Jeanne Curtis said. "It's another doorway into Penn."

However, student response to the new home page has been mixed. The most criticism stems from difficulty in locating Penn InTouch, the secure site where students can take care of everything from registering for classes and checking their transcript to accessing financial services and searching for jobs.

Previously a link directly on the Penn home page, Penn InTouch is now on a second tier of the Web site. Students have to go through current student highlights before locating the link.

"It's hard to find Penn-In-Touch, which is pretty important," College senior Samantha Chan said.

Wharton senior Mark Javitch echoed Chan's sentiments.

"The new site is a bit hard to navigate," Javitch said. "Penn InTouch is difficult to find. It's just not easily accessible anymore."

In order to counter the negative feedback, a new link, "Where to Find Previous Homepage Links," was added to the Web site. It provides details about where the previous links were on the old home page, as well as their new location on the revamped version.

And officials also admit that they had been designing the site with the Penn outsider in mind.

However, not all student response has been negative.

"I like the new home page because it forces you to go deeper into the site," Engineering junior Barrett Lawson said.

"Anyway," he added, "I just bookmark Penn InTouch."

Administrators said they are confident that any student concerns about the new homepage will be dispelled in October with the implementation of the PennPortal system.

This internal Web site will provide individual links to Penn InTouch and other important operating systems, as well as allowing the student the flexibility of personalizing his or her home page by incorporating personal links.

Administrators are very enthusiastic about the project.

"We would love for the students to love this and make it their own," Curtis said.

There has also been positive feedback in response to the newly designed graphics on the home page, as well as the decision to feature search engine Google on the home page instead of AltaVista, the previous choice.

Corrections Robin Beck is, in fact, the vice president of Information Services and Computing.

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