Topic: Administrative

July 7, 2008

Ball State's Web site has received national and international praise with multiple Web honors since the site's re-launch in October 2007.

The Ball State site has earned awards or nominations from four national or international professional organizations in education and new media marketing.

"It's reaffirming that these professional organizations have recognized the best-practice and user-centric approaches we have tried to take throughout the project," said Nancy Prater, university Web coordinator.

The recognitions are:

  • Circle of Excellence Award in the complete institutional Web site category, from the Council for the Advancement and Support of Education (CASE), an international professional organization for advancement and communication professionals in education. Ball State earned the top award given this year, a silver medal. No university has ever won a gold medal in this category.
  • Webby Honoree in the school category. The Webby is a leading international award honoring excellence on the Internet in a wide variety of industries.
  • Award of Merit in the Internet/Web site category in the annual Admissions Advertising Awards given by Admissions Marketing Report.
  • Several nominations in the first eduStyle awards competition. Awards will be announced in late July. EduStyle.net is a design gallery dedicated to higher education Web sites.

The nominations are for Judge's Choice and People's Choice awards in the following categories:

  • overall Web site
  • best home page
  • best redesign
  • best student blog, this last one is for the Experience Ball State site a www.bsu.edu/reallife.

"The awards speak highly of the terrific work done by many people across the university who were involved in various extents with our Web site relaunch," Prater said.

By Hillary Tribbett