Website prepares for construction

Updates are underway and coming soon to outdated college webpage

DEVIN MALONE Reporter @roudupnews

While charts and maps help explorers find their destinations, the Pierce website helps students navigate campus resources.

After years of using the current Pierce College website, the Pierce IT department is looking to change things by creating a new website that will address some of the concerns that students and staff have regarding the current one.

Pierce IT Manager Mark Henderson wrote in an email interview this new website will include an updated user interface, as well as make the site generally more mobile friendly.

“The changes that are going to be made will be to adhere to recent best practices that adopt ADA compliance, mobile-friendly access and improved UI/UX,” Henderson wrote.

The IT department will also be working closely with other departments around Pierce to maintain the site’s front page, as well as work on the architecture.

Although individual departments maintain the content for their sections, the public information officer maintains the front page content.

“The IT web services group assists with guiding the architecture and design limits,” Henderson said in an email response. “We handle the web services back office functions and strategic development. We cover all potential knowledge and technical gaps that may arise within departments regarding authoring their sections.”

To Christopher Corning, an assistant professor of English, the two biggest issues with the current website are the lack of updates regarding events or campus wide changes, as well a general sense of difficulty for students looking for resources.

“The biggest challenges I’ve seen is when students can’t easily find the information that they’re looking for,” Corning said. “And perhaps where there is information, it’s time specific

No time to adjust to schedule

Students and faculty question class time slots

ALEXIS CANELO & NICK MARTINEZ Reporter @alexiscanelo_ @NickEsai

Sometimes the bigger decisions on campus are the ones that don’t get made. Faculty are currently not allowed to schedule classes during an 80-minute time block between 2:10 p.m. and 3:30 p.m.

Michael Gend, Performing Arts chair, said department chairs and program directors met to discuss the data collected from the surveys sent out to students last spring and this fall semester.

The majority of students and faculty voted to keep the current schedule, according to the survey.

“The department chairs and program directors met and reviewed all of the survey data both from faculty and students and the majority, in both cases, wants to keep the time blocks the way they currently are, the ones that we're using this semester,” Gend said.

While the decision to change the time block was not supported in student and faculty surveys, the idea continues to be discussed throughout different groups on campus.

Changing the time block would mean the new schedule would not be compliant with the 10-minute passing period. Also, this conflicts with the time slot needed for college hour, which is an allotted amount of time meant to increase student engagement on campus.

The Academic Senate will vote on Dec. 3 whether to address the issue.

“My assumption is they're going to approve it and then in that case we're not going to revisit it this session of Academic Senate,” Gend said. “If they don't approve it, I imagine there will be further debate, discussion and maybe a new resolution from a different body.”

Since there has been no update to the current time block, some faculty voiced concerns over the lack of change to the schedule.

Communications Professor Aric Eidadu said he had students who are still not adjusted to the current schedule.

“I have a class that starts at 6:50 p.m.,” Eidadu said. “I always taught it at 7 p.m., so to make a long story short, a lot of my students happen to be late.”

Another problem that was brought up was the way the survey was written.

Psychology Professor Jennifer Moses said the format and language used in the survey was confusing for students.

Moses said not enough options were explored. She believes there needs to be a robust discussion which includes constituents.

[for the full story visit theroundupnews.com] and it doesn’t get updated within a timely manner. Sometimes it will say ‘coming up soon’ and it’s something that has already passed.”

Corning said he has noticed the slow news updates to campus wide events on the current website.

“I believe that right now, the website makes reference to our ‘new’ SIS system, which went into effect back in January,” Corning said.

Henderson however did state that the new website will help streamline this process, making it easier for students to find and get the help they might need for their courses.

“The intended improvements will prove to be a better resource to empower the student with information relevant to their education and campus experience,” Henderson said.

Lawrence Krikorian, an instructor of English would still like see a possible boost in security when it comes to this new rendition of the Pierce Website.

“When I go on the WiFi with my phone, it’s unsecure. There’s no security, so people can spy on you,” Kirkorian said.

Henderson and the IT department are still working on getting the proper assets for the job to be properly done, as well as focusing on other current issues. Once these are dealt with, the group intends to continue working on the new website project. The launch date for the new website has yet to be determined.

“We are developing a project plan that should assist in garnering resources to support training and development,” Henderson said. A website restructure is a longer process; however, we are working to resolve some immediate concerns now. A base timeline is being drafted with the ability to alter the timeline as resources and training is made available.”