Case Studies

ABS website content

CLIENT:
Australian Bureau of Statistics

PROJECT BRIEF:
Redevelop the existing Education Services unit web pages and provide a plan for their ongoing management.

DESCRIPTION:
When the ABS Education Services unit contacted Red Pony, they had already identified a number of problems with their existing web pages. They were difficult to navigate, poorly maintained, employed a diverse range of document types, styles and formats, and were not written to target the education sector.

Red Pony undertook a radical redesign of the web pages to address the range of shortcomings outlined by the client.

The basic structure of the website was completely reorganised, dividing it into specific sections for teachers and students, allowing content to be more focused for the target audience. After an extensive review of best-practice learning materials, Red Pony developed a standard template for classroom activities and supervised the development of over twenty new activities to be launched with the new pages.

A series of interactive games created by the Le@arning Federation were incorporated into the student area, in addition to a downloadable version of a game from the ‘A Tale of Two Worlds’ CD-ROM.

The pages were developed using ABS’s existing Lotus Notes web publishing system. Red Pony brought a number of tools to the project, including information architecture diagrams, flowcharts and schematic diagrams, wireframes and templates.

The design of the new pages was tested prior to launch with educational professionals in the ABS usability test lab in Canberra. Throughout the 11-month project, Red Pony consultant Peter Riches liaised extensively with staff in the Melbourne-based education unit and the Canberra-based IT and web publishing section.

"I look forward to working with Peter Riches again in the future and highly recommend Red Pony to any other organisation seeking professional technical communication services."

Paul Taylor, Director
Education Services, ABS

For more information, visit www.abs.gov.au.

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