<p>I have a sneaking suspicion that many colleges, contrary to conventional advice on website design, - and most especially the high-end selective ones - do not place a high premium on usability over design. Increasingly, the entertainment factor and surprise “extras” - like the extra features on dvds - draw deeper and longer searches as well as repeat visits. So perhaps it isn’t always a negative that a prospective student has to go through multiple levels, to find, and then interpret, key information. Even though for some the whole process is more and more like navigating an obstacle course - just look at the number of posts on CC made by students asking for help to questions that are “clearly” answered somewhere, and sometimes in more than one place, on the website. So, the design of these sites -“navigability” - does not always strive to strike a balance between usability and design. Information is given on different levels within the site, often embedded in rather complex formats. Too accessible or functional, then, can also mean not engaging the right kind of student - and this is important because a website ought to do more than communicate the bare bones of admissions information - it ought to get across that elusive notion of “fit” so popular in today’s admission’s lingo.</p>
<p>Of interest on this topic:</p>
<p>“Insights for Institutional Website Design”</p>