LourdesWorld.com
Lourdes College
Sylvania, Ohio
History
Lourdes College is a values-based college, founded by the Sisters of Saint Francis. The school will celebrate its 50th anniversary in 2008. Initially, the school was a woman's college, but much has changed during the past half-century. Now, the college is recognized as an all inclusive school that welcomes men and women with diverse backgrounds and educational goals. Like many institutes of higher education, Lourdes College of Sylvania, Ohio, wanted to initiate a social networking platform that would allow its internal and external constituents to communicate with one another.
Challenge
As part of its focus on the 21st century, Lourdes College took steps to go forward with a social networking site, similar in form and function to MySpace, You Tube and Facebook. The challenge for the college's administration was to offer a site in which current members of the Lourdes College community could comfortably communicate, while still encouraging potential traditionally-aged students to take a serious interest in the school.
The space had to reflect the future, without disrespecting the foundation on which the school was founded. To embellish the name of the school, the space was named "LOURDESWORLD." As the agency of record for Lourdes College, the Thread team knew that the graphics needed to balance the LOURDESWORLD name to fit with the overall campaign of the school "Discover Your Place."
Graphically, the site is bold and bright with fluorescent shades of pinks, oranges, blues and greens throughout. The colors convey that Lourdes is hip to what's happening in the student world and beyond. The site also features podcasts from the president of Lourdes College, Dr. Robert Helmer, and links to Facebook, MySpace, YouTube and flickr.
Collaboration
The Thread Information Design (Thread) team worked with the Lourdes College in-house marketing department to create a social networking site that was dynamic, captivating and able to provide social networking abilities to potential participants. The college staff met with the Thread team on several occasions, always emphasizing that they wanted this site to act as a "virtual student union" for its students, faculty and others involved with the school.
Thread had previously worked with Lourdes to reconstruct their primary college website, an experience that enabled the Thread team to learn more about the expectations, goals and objectives of the Lourdes staff. Thread became the school's agency of record during the construction of LOURDESWORLD and went on to design a successful multi-media campaign for the school. The campaign, "Discover your Place" is well-placed on the LOURDESWORLD site.
Results
Lourdes College students and faculty report that having an interactive mini-site like LOURDESWORLD has given them the opportunity to reach out to those people they might, otherwise, not have reached. Students now have the opportunity to interact and collaborate with faculty, staff and students from other schools.
From blogs to podcasts, LOURDESWORLD has helped to propel the college into this century. The site enhances the online experience for the college, while not overshadowing the school's primary site. Because Lourdes College is comprised primarily of students who commute, LOURDESWORLD has acted as a connecting point for those who want to increase their participation in the school's direction.
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