OVERVIEW
I was tasked with creating two websites on Google Sites for my client, an undergraduate law and data ethics professor, who is teaching two courses this semester. The goal was to provide a user-friendly website where her students could easily access course materials, assignments, and additional resources.

Professor Black was preparing for the upcoming semester, where she would be teaching two distinct courses: Business Law and Business Ethics. Each course had its own set of materials, assignments, and resources that needed to be easily accessible to students.

In previous semesters, the client found herself overwhelmed by the volume of emails from students asking basic questions about assignments, deadlines, and other course-related details. She realized that these frequent inquiries were largely due to students struggling to fully grasp her expectations from the syllabus. To address this issue, she wanted to create dedicated websites for each course that would serve as a comprehensive and interactive guide for her students. Each site had to be tailored to the specific needs of the course while maintaining a consistent design that reflected her teaching style and the course content.

The primary challenge was to create websites that were not only functional and easy to navigate but also engaging for students, encouraging them to use the sites regularly. Additionally, the sites needed to be completed within 3 weeks so she would have it in time for the first day of class.

I was also based in Hong Kong while Professor Black was based in Nashville, TN during a majority of the project so navigating the 13 hour time difference was another challenge we had to navigate.

I started by discussing with Professor Black her expectations as well as the needs of her students. Understanding the course structure and the types of materials/resources the students would need to access was crucial in knowing the different web pages needed for the website.

My client also sent me one of her colleague’s course websites as an example of what she was envisioning for her website and how to translate and display the information from her syllabi to the course websites I would be building for her.

From the meetings with Professor Black and conducting competitive analysis, we determined the basic structure of the website:

After a few meetings and email exchanges with my client and conducting preliminary research, I was ready to translate my insights to create my first iteration of the website. See below for screenshots of V1 of the website:

A second iteration of the website was created incorporating client feedback. The client expressed that V1 felt too impersonal because of the typeface and color scheme and wanted the website to feel more welcoming and friendly for students. V1 used primarily cool tones and serif types (Lora and Merriweather) for heading and body text, which made the website feel a little too sophisticated and unapproachable. In V2 I switched the typefaces to Calistoga for headings and Montserrat for body text to give the website more personality and make it more fun and accessible to students. Some major updates also included:

In the final iteration of the websites, I made the following changes:

Client Feedback: The client was highly satisfied with the outcome, noting that the websites were exactly what she needed to enhance her students' learning experience.

What I learned: This project reinforced the importance of understanding the end-user and the client's specific needs. It also highlighted the versatility of Google Sites as a platform for educational purposes.

Next Steps: I plan to follow up with the client after the semester to gather feedback from her and her students via an end-of-semester survey, which will help me to refine my approach for future projects. I also plan on using Google Analytics to see how students are using the site.