A new iteration of WVU Today has transformed the University’s News and Information Web site into a multimedia, interactive daily news source, designed so that breaking and important information will find all members of the West Virginia University community.

Launched today, Aug. 31, the new site (http://wvutoday.wvu.edu/) will link the University directly with its core audiences, providing first-out-of-the box coverage on major University events, including coverage of presidential visits and remarks, exclusive insight on research and curricular innovation and first-hand, in-depth accounts of student, faculty and staff endeavors and achievements.

WVU will package these stories using a variety of platforms, including written articles, audio and video podcasts, live webcasts, archived video programming, documentary photography and narrative imagery.

“People receive and share news and information in ways that are radically different from just a year or two ago,” said Chris Martin, vice president for University Relations. “The new WVU Today site is designed to respond to those dynamic changes in how, when and where people get their news. With this site, we will be able to build a dialogue with our audiences and invite them to contribute to telling and building the story with us.”

This is not the first time WVU has used technological innovations to find its audiences and take information directly to them. The recently-launched WVU Mobile Web site and iWVU, the University’s official iPhone application, provide users with anytime, anywhere access to a variety of tools – including an interactive campus map, an events calendar and the WVU directory – using Web-enabled mobile devices. Additionally, digital message boards, or information stations – located in classroom buildings, residence halls, PRT stations and recreation facilities across campus – broadcast up-to-the-minute news, features and interactive programming, as well as emergency safety information.

WVU Today will aggregate all of the news and information into one site and share the detailed, comprehensive and multi-platformed stories that offer an insiders’ view of WVU’s regional, national and global impact. Site visitors will use channels, or navigational links, to access information about six facets of University life: students, faculty, research, health care, athletics and the larger WVU community of alumni, friends and partners. For example:

• On the Students channel, visitors can read about the 13 upperclassmen who traveled to China as part of the WVNano International Research Experience for Students, creating invaluable connections in one of the fastest developing countries and economies in the world.

• On the Faculty channel, visitors will learn about English professor James Harms, the author of several full-length collections of poetry and an instrumental figure in creating the University’s MFA program. He was recently chosen as the first featured writer in a new online literary and arts magazine created by an alumnus of the program.

• On the Community channel, a video story about two WVU nursing students, who held a free health clinic in Preston County, shows how the University impacts the community and how students receive an education both inside and outside of the classroom.

• On the Sports channel, visitors can access the latest scores, news and features about University sports teams, including the volleyball team, which recently sailed to a second-place finish in the WVU Classic.

• On the Health Sciences channel, visitors get a glimpse into the changes Betty Shelton, associate dean for undergraduate academic affairs, has implemented in admissions at the nursing school; changes that not only increased retention rates at WVU but altered the admissions process in nursing schools across the country so that candidates are judged on maturity and dedication to the career, not just GPA.

• On the Research channel, visitors will meet, via video, the WVU scientists who are attempting to find a cure for cancer and building the knowledge base for the next generation of researchers.

With such a large and distinguished group of faculty and researchers, WVU has experts on virtually all of the issues that dominate the national and international stage. WVU Today will feature these scholars on its home page on a regular basis, to help visitors learn more about them and their areas of expertise, and to help put current events into greater perspective.

Elsewhere on WVU Today, visitors are able to link to social media tools, where they can share stories, news, memories and even advice. The site uses a tagging system, which allows users to easily locate related stories.

“We hope people will visit WVU Today daily, but we also hope they will use Facebook, Twitter and other social media to share these stories with their friends and followers on a regular basis,” News and Information Services Director Dan Kim said. “Our goal is to provide the kind of information about the University – its students, alumni, faculty and researchers – that inspires people to engage with us and with each other.”

To encourage such interaction, the three professional technologists who built WVU Today – Web Services’ Adam Glenn, Dave Olsen and Steve Spriggs – created an interactive feature, which allows the University to post questions on the site and for users to respond with their insight, input and ideas.

For example, WVU is currently inviting visitors to post their suggestions about additional features they would like considered for the new WVU Mobile Web site and iPhone application.

“We’re very excited about the new WVU Today,” said Becky Lofstead, assistant vice president for communications and one of the innovators of the original site. “Until now, WVU Today was essentially a collection of news, but today it’s a marketplace of information that takes the enormous and important work that goes on at WVU every day to our vast audiences – it both broadcasts live and breaking news and memorializes and archives it. It’s truly a multimedia, interactive daily news and information site.”

Visit the new site at http://wvutoday.wvu.edu

-WVU-

aj/08/31/09

CONTACT: News and Information Services
304-293-6997

WVU News on the Web – http://wvutoday.wvu.edu