Athabasca University

2008

Athabasca University is one of Canadas largest universities with more than 37,000 students. Athabasca delivers all their programs through distance and online education, so their website is a critical communication and recruitment tool. Yellow Pencil helped to rethink and redevelop the Athabasca website to communicate with prospective and current students in a more meaningful and personable way.

Yellow Pencil held workshops with staff, students and stakeholders, researched best practices from across the globe and tested our ideas on prospective students. All this research paired with the AU communications plan lead us to create a strategic approach in the form of a new design, architecture, conversational style, wireframes and a set of templates that can roll out to the entire organization.

The result of the work is most of the extensive site rolled over to the new look, with more sections of the enormous web property migrating every day. The internal team is delighted with the work and students are finding it a better way to learn about AU and start their education. Yellow Pencil worked with AU on their implementation of Alfresco content management system, building custom plug-ins, providing content management expertise and ensuring that our designs integrated easily with this tool. The new AU website makes it easier than ever to accelerate learning and discover opportunities for personal development. See whats in your future: www.athabascau.ca