Harvard College, the undergraduate admissions and financial aid division of Harvard University, has been a long-time partner of Mediacurrent, with over a decade of collaboration focused on ongoing support and optimization. When Harvard College updated its print materials for student recruitment, they wanted a way to reflect this fresh new look on their website—efficiently and cost-effectively.
Project Highlights
- A refresh approach launched in just three months, providing a revitalized feel, mirroring Harvard’s new student recruitment print materials, without a costly or time-consuming redesign.
- The “Harvard Casual” concept, inspired by financial aid programs, reflects Harvard’s inclusive and welcoming spirit with image-based components.
- Targeted, carefully selected component redesigns kept the project on-schedule while delivering an updated user experience and agility for future optimization.
Rather than opting for a full site redesign, we identified key areas to introduce new design elements and components to refresh the site’s appearance. The goal was to provide a revitalized feel without requiring an entire overhaul. Our focus was on improving usability, making it easier for prospective students to find essential information, and allowing the Harvard College team to tell a more relatable and engaging story about life at Harvard.
We equipped the Harvard College team with the flexibility to mix and match both existing and newly introduced components, refining the storytelling experience on the homepage and ensuring a seamless transition from print to digital. This "refresh" approach allowed us to implement changes and deliver results much faster than a traditional website redesign while building a new foundation for future expansion.
Humanizing Harvard
A key focus throughout our work with Harvard College was finding ways to make this prestigious institution feel more approachable, while still staying true to the core Harvard identity. To achieve this, we developed the concept of “Harvard Casual.” This approach was inspired by Harvard’s financial aid programs, which make the university accessible to students from families with incomes under $85,000. The concept aims to reflect Harvard’s inclusive and welcoming spirit, while maintaining its tradition of excellence.
We introduced more image-based components to the site to help bring this vision to life. One of the key features we added was the ability to display TikToks, offering a modern and relatable way to showcase student life. These additions give the Harvard College team a chance to present the Harvard experience in a way that resonates with today’s students, making the institution feel both prestigious and more accessible.
Intentional Component Choices
We carefully selected a few key components to redesign and build from scratch, ensuring these changes would have the greatest impact on the overall feel of the website without requiring a full redesign. Our goal was to breathe new life into the site by making these targeted updates while retaining the essential structure and functionality that the site’s users are familiar with.
To streamline the process and ensure that the Harvard team could maintain control, we designed the new components to integrate seamlessly with the existing ones in the CMS. With just a simple toggle, the team can easily switch between the traditional and newly designed components without having to re-enter content, rebuild pages, or disrupt their workflow. This flexibility empowers the Harvard College team to keep the site fresh and up-to-date with minimal effort, allowing them to adapt and evolve the user experience over time as their needs and the digital landscape change.
This approach not only saved time but also allowed us to provide an updated user experience without the complexity and disruption of a complete website overhaul. It was a smart, efficient way to refresh the site, giving the team more agility to implement future enhancements while keeping content management as streamlined as possible.
