By Jade Inglada and Maria Isidoro
The Information Technology Department is working on an updated version of the East Los Angeles College website and plans to launch it winter 2015.
The website will have an upgraded design and be compatible with mobile devices, a feature that the current one lacks.
IT manager Gonzalo Mendoza said that the purpose of the website update is to create a mobile-friendly platform for students’ smartphone and tablet devices.
The new design is called Mobile-First Responsive Website Design, or mobile responsive, and aims to minimize content distractions, provide better access and deliver easy-reading information.
Mendoza said his goal is to give students easier and faster access to the website’s search links than the previous model.
“The new website needs to be friendly, appealing, colorful, easy to read and also accommodated to the new mobile devices,” Mendoza said.
The inspiration for ELAC’s new layout comes from some of the top ranked universities and colleges’ mobile responsive sites to implement its best features as well.
The primary reason for this is to attract future students for enrollment.
The University of Oxford, Stanford University and Saint Paul College are three of the primary mobile responsive websites selected to develop a clean, efficient website for ELAC, Mendoza said.
Mendoza and the IT staff are revamping the home page and working together with various members of the administration and academic chair departments to update and change the content on the website.
The managing web content company for higher education institutions, OmniUpdate, is helping to create an easy-to-use mobile responsive website.
The revamp will allow new content updates to post automatically once it is approved.
The content changes will be updated after the department chairs and deans validate and approve the new and accurate information.
Mendoza said if the content needs major changes, it will need to go to administration for approval.
Since there is a lot of content that cannot fit on the home page of the current website, students have to go through several pages in order to find what they want, Mendoza said.
“We are organizing the website in terms of where the web tabs are, where the information is and make it easier for our new students to find the relevant information they’re looking for,” Mendoza said.
ELAC President Marvin Martinez said it’s important that the college website be modernized for its students since the last design update was in 2008.
Mendoza said that there will be a conference with ELAC’s student government and clubs about the website’s new appearance at the end of October.
The IT department will ask students for their opinions on the new design before the website goes live.