As Park faculty, staff and students may be aware, the university’s website has been and still is undergoing changes since last fall.

According to Patrick Baxter, web manager for the Office of University Communications and Marketing, the website has already been condensed down to 13,500 pages of information from 37,600 pages, which he considers a big improvement.

Baxter, along with Vice President of University Communications and Marketing Rita Weighill, are continuously working on more improvements for the future – such as the website being more interactive with courses, profile pages for faculty and staff and more information for Life at Park.

However, in order for the website to continue seeing more updates and improvements, Baxter and Weighill want to see and hear more suggestions from students.

“We want to see students get involved and come forward with suggestions,” Baxter said. “Criticism doesn’t help us.”

Many of the problems the Office of University Communications and Marketing is seeing with moving forward on improving the website is people say they do not approve of certain things on the website but never offer any feedback or comments to the office to let them know what they want to see done to the website.

“We live off feedback from students,” Baxter said,” so we really want and need to hear from students and even faculty and staff.”

Weighill said faculty and staff have been better about suggestions and feedback on a few things they want to see down with the website, which has helped some.

One of the many goals for the website is it for be of easy use and navigation for visitors to the site, especially prospective students.

Baxter said he would also like to see MyPark be the primary source for current students and the website to highlight more student successes at Park.

“Study abroad and athletics already do a great job of showcasing students,” he said.

“Dr. [Virginia] Brackett is really good at informing students of internships and scholarships, also,” said Weighill.

But both Baxter and Weighill suggested spotlighting even more student successes such as biology and history research that occurs and engagement from foreign students, considering a portion of Park’s student population is from outside America.

Another improvement Baxter said he plans on working on is providing a message center for comments on the webpage on the footer of every page.

With so many students depending on the Internet for school work and other activities, the message center would be convenient, especially for those who are using the Park website for homework and class activity.

One problem that has been a severe issue for students who use the website is bad links.

“50 to 60 percent of the bad links are from assignments,” said Baxter. “Instructors provide links on the website for their students to use and many of the links are bad and no longer working.”

With a message center, if a student should run into a bad link, Baxter’s email address could be provided for the student to let him know about the situation.

But, in order for future changes and improvements to be made, students need to speak up and be heard and let the office know what they want to see done to the website.

“My door is always open,” said Weighill, “and every piece of feedback is always welcome.”

Weighill can be reached by email at [email protected] or in her office in Room 12 in Mackay Hall.

Baxter can be reached by him email, [email protected].