1512-5400-Website-Redesign-Attach-1.pdf

Massachusetts College of Art and Design RFP 15-12 Website Redesign Services

Attachment # 1 – Specifications and Description of Services

Table of Contents

1. Who we are

2. Statement of Purpose

3. Project Overview

4. Project Objectives

5. Scope of Work and Deliverables

6. Design Requirements

7. Technical Requirements

8. Basis of Selection

9. Schedule

10. Contact for RFP Response

11. Terms

12. Additional Materials

Who We Are

Founded in 1873, Massachusetts College of Art and Design has a 142-year legacy of leadership as the nation’s first and only independent public college of art and design, as well as the first art college in the United States to grant a degree. Never before had a state established a school solely for the purpose of art instruction. From the beginning, the College recognized that excellence knows no class, gender, or racial distinctions and welcomed students from all economic and ethnic backgrounds—a radical act in its day.

The College is one of a handful of comprehensive, specialized schools of art and design. Its peer institutions are: Art Center College of Design (CA), California College of the Arts, California Institute of the Arts, College for Creative Studies (MI), Columbus College of Art and Design, Maryland Institute College of Art, Ringling College of Art and Design (FL), Rhode Island School of Design, School of the Art Institute of Chicago , and the University of the Arts (PA).1 MassArt is one of the most selective colleges among the entire group of thirty-five independent colleges of art and design in the United States and Canada.

The historical imperative toward access and opportunity continues to be a key commitment at MassArt today. MassArt is known for providing broad access to a high quality professional arts education, accompanied by a strong general education in the liberal arts. The College offers the bachelor of fine arts degree in 22 disciplines; graduate programs including master of fine arts, master of architecture, and master of arts in teaching; certificate programs; professional and continuing education; and K-12 programs. It serves over 1,700 undergraduate students, 150

1 From the Massachussetts College of Art and Design Performance Report, available here http://goo.gl/iM9Ky2.

graduate students, and approximately 500 students each year through its continuing education programs.

MassArt’s undergraduate enrollment has grown by 42 percent—from 1,200 to 1,700—in the last decade. As a state university, about 70% of students come from Massachusetts, 34% from the broader U.S., and 4% from international origins. Twenty-four percent of the student body are U.S. students of color. Students choose MassArt for its academic excellence, resources and facilities, dynamic urban campus, tuition value, and close connections with a renowned and distinguished faculty. Students are supported by 184 full-time-equivalent faculty members who are practicing artists, designers, scholars, and educators. The faculty is represented by a union (MSCA), and the staff is a mix of unionized (AFSCME and APA) and non-union professionals.

The FTE student-faculty ratio in the BFA program is 11:1.2

MassArt’s faculty, its extensive studios, the wealth of resources in its arts library, and the breadth of its curriculum are widely considered to be among the best in the nation.

As a public institution, part of the MassArt mission is to serve as a resource to the greater community, so each year it offers an array of free public programs, including innovative gallery exhibitions, lectures, events, and professional development opportunities.

Website Redesign Project Overview

Statement of Purpose The purpose of the Website Redesign project is to build a website that reflects the dynamism and vitality of the MassArt community, and satisfies the academic, business and informational needs of external and internal constituents.

Project Overview The MassArt website is the primary Marketing and Communications vehicle for communicating the College's mission, identity, and values, and raising the visibility of the institution. The President of Massachusetts College of Art and Design has charged the project team with improving the user experience of the website, and considers it a top institutional priority to support the College's goals, which include enhanced institutional visibility, increased enrollment, and increased contributed revenue.

In the fall of 2014, the President of the College mandated the MassArt web team, consisting of staff within the Technology and Marketing and Communications departments, to improve the capabilities and aesthetic appeal of the website to effectively meet the College’s goals, which include enhanced institutional visibility, increased enrollment, increased contributed revenue, and broadened community engagement.

2 Statistics taken from the Massachussetts College of Art and Design Vital Signs Fall 2014 document, available here http://goo.gl/Jqp1wD.

In the spring of 2015, MassArt engaged a consultant to conduct a research and analysis project to look at MassArt’s web properties. The research phase was intended to provide a structured, formalized, objective process to gather input from stakeholders, assess the existing websites’ usability, features, functionality, reach and effectiveness, and provide the College with a clear articulation of emerging and future technology trends and website development best practices.

The analysis phase was intended to provide comprehensive analysis of the research and an articulation of the functionality, features, design, structure and technology required to deliver a more effective, compelling and usable MassArt website. This RFP is one of the work products resulting from that engagement, and the chosen firm will have access to all of that engagement’s research and analysis deliverables and data as part of this Website Redesign project.

Currently, MassArt has two primary web properties: massart.edu and inside.massart.edu, which are somewhat interconnected but lack a cohesive user experience. The navigation relies primarily on lengthy text menus, instead of content. The content is text-heavy and provides little visual engagement, compared to other art and design school websites, many of which entice and engage visitors to explore the site primarily through visuals and graphics.

Map of Site Structure

Both massart.edu and inside.massart.edu are managed by the MassArt web team. As previously indicated, the MassArt web team consists of staff from the Marketing and Communications Department, who manage the content, and staff from the Technology Department, who provide technical assistance and support, and manage the websites’ technical infrastructure. Editorial maintenance is performed by designated staff members throughout the College who have been trained on the Ingeniux Web CMS. Many stakeholders have expressed frustration at their inability to easily post fresh content to the site in a timely manner. They have also expressed that the site, from their perspective, lacks a viable framework for showcasing current student work3.

This perspective, combined with organizational changes several years ago which granted each program/department/institute more autonomy, led to the creation of multiple independent, “satellite” websites created and maintained by academic and administrative departments throughout the College. These satellite websites, such as sim.massart.edu and dynamicmediainstitute.org, contain valuable information for prospective and current students, but the sites are not hosted on the Ingeniux CMS platform and are not administered by the web team. Consequently, the data hosted by these sites is generally not integrated with the College’s main web properties. Satellite sites have been identified and listed in the MassArt Web Presence Diagram4, where they are categorized based on how well they adhere to the current visual identity guidelines, as well as which type of audience they serve. One of the ancillary goals of the MassArt web team is to implement a collaborative technical platform for the new website which is flexible and robust to unify the content and data that currently resides in the disparate data stores of the satellite sites, and ultimately leverage the content, and the data and entrepreneurial drive of the departments (exemplified by the myriad of satellite websites), which provides a more cohesive user experience, enhanced usability, and a unified, coherent message and experience for MassArt’s internal and external constituents.

Note: this chart also includes sites which are not externally focused.

Primary Target Audience

3 The Ingeniux CMS is technically capable of hosting and displaying nearly all of the popular digital media formats for audio and video. The criticism–that the site does not effectively showcase students–is rooted in the decentralized nature of the site’s content management, and the lack of an effective workflow or system to capture and display user-generated content. In other words, these issues stems from a failure to generate, store, centralize and share user-generated content, rather than a lack of capability on the CMS’ part.

4 The MassArt Web Presence Diagram is available here http://inside.massart.edu/Documents/inside.massart.edu/committees/MassArt-web-presence.pdf.

Prospective students have been identified as the primary target audience for the website. Their needs and expectations include: responsive page layouts optimized for mobile devices, enhanced usability, visual representations of College culture and environment, multimedia samples of recent student work, and a narrative connecting their aspirations to post-graduate career success.

Additional, secondary target audiences for the website include, in descending order of priority:

current students, alumni, faculty & staff, and the Greater Boston community.

Identified Needs and Expectations

Recurring critiques of the website include:

● Dissatisfaction with the multi-site structure

○ massart.edu

○ inside.massart.edu

○ alumni.massart.edu

● Too many satellite websites

○ blogs.massart.edu

○ blogs.massart.edu/idfocus

○ blogs.massart.edu/illustration

○ sf.massart.edu

○ sim.massart.edu

○ filmvideo.massart.edu

○ dynamicmediainstitute.org

● The calendar

○ Lack of enthusiasm for using the existing events calendar5 impedes flow of information and awareness across academic departments and to internal and external constituents.

● Updating content is difficult

○ Despite existing protocols, the current workflow and the CMS tool are often cited as hampering timely updates, and support for multimedia content is perceived to be limited.6

Users find navigating the multi-site structure confusing because the sites lack a consistent user interface, including disparate visual identity systems and inconsistent navigation. Administrators express concern that in some cases there may be duplicate or conflicting information on different sites, presenting a quandary for content editors and site visitors as to which data on which site, is authoritative. This lack of clarity could expose the College to the risk of providing incorrect information to users, which in some cases might have legal implications for the College, and creates additional work for administrators, students and faculty as they try to

5 http://www.massart.edu/about_massart/events_calendar.html 6 As previously indicated, the existing Ingeniux CMS has the technical capability to display the most widely audio and video digital media formats, and/or rich media.

provide clarity when confusion arises. Furthermore, satellite websites ‘silo’ information within departments, and preclude massart.edu from leveraging department-generated content on the main site that may be of interest to visitors.

User feedback consistently points to the desire for improved capabilities for a new website.

These aspirational capabilities are summarized as follows:

● Enhanced website usability

● Focused visual storytelling

● Intuitive navigation

● Capability to easily showcase student work

● A calendar that is more functional and user-friendly for editors and viewers

● Enhanced capacity for embedding multimedia

● Responsive design

Project Objectives

Since massart.edu is the College’s primary communications vehicle, it should facilitate the web team’s objectives to communicate the dynamism and vitality of the MassArt community, and satisfy the academic, business and informational needs of external and internal constituents. It should engage the primary audience of prospective students to learn more about the College and its culture and values, and enhance the school’s ability to recruit and enroll the the most qualified applicants.

Many stakeholders have indicated the need to focus on students and show student work in order to accurately convey the culture and talent housed in the institution. The multi-site structure needs to be integrated into a dynamic and immersive user experience which delivers a unified message reflecting the College’s marketing and communications strategy, but which also highlights community-driven departmental sections deeper in the site. Design of the academic department sections should be flexible enough to allow customization for the unique needs and narrative approach of each group, while maintaining common navigation and a tie to the institutional brand. Global navigation should provide consistent and easy access to services and tools, such as the calendar. Content that is not relevant to the public can be organized behind user logins.

Create a responsive design that’s visually engaging.

The design of the MassArt website will need to be visually engaging on a variety of devices. It should draw users to the school by featuring dynamic content, in addition to being informative and descriptive without being too text-heavy. Prospective students of MassArt are likely visual thinkers and will be engaged by images, video, and graphical storytelling. However, the design must maintain a high level of clarity in presenting the logic of navigation. As the target audience of prospective students will view content on various devices, and especially mobile devices, it is important that the website is responsive to screen size and can account for the adoption of emerging trends in web and digital media.

Showcase student work in brand experience.

MassArt is a creative community that generates visual content. This fact should be evident in communicating the brand experience of the school. The most accurate way to convey the creative culture of the institution is to showcase student work as part of the core messaging. As well, student work is a primary engagement metric for prospective students. They want to be inspired by the level of work they will able to make at MassArt, the kind of courses offered by different departments, the reputation of the faculty, and evidence of the creative network they would join.

Simplify navigation by catering to audience type.

While prospective students are the main audience to target with the MassArt web redesign, there are many audiences that will anticipate service from the website. Audiences include:

current students, faculty and staff, alumni and parents. Information should be organized to cater to separate audiences and the navigation should reflect the organization. The website should provide clear pathways for each audience to the content most relevant to them.

Within the category of prospective students there is a greater breakdown of audience types.

Undergraduate, graduate, continuing education, international, transfer students and guidance counselors will require specific content and should be able to easily locate it within the site.

Audience Balancing diagram

Enable easy editorial workflow for posting updates and multimedia.

The community at MassArt is talented and capable of generating excellent content. Community members want the opportunity to share their content online, and will take initiative to display their own content if the process is user-friendly and updates can be produced in near real-time, as evidenced by the current multi-site structure of the MassArt web presence. The new website should enable an easy editorial workflow for contributing multimedia in order to align the creative energy from the community with messaging strategies from the institution leadership. A simple workflow for posting and uploading content that allows for guidance from the Marketing and Communications Department should be a priority for the site redesign. The site should utilize a “database with filtered views” approach to organizing content in order to leverage the content that departments produce to benefit the higher institution.

Database with Filtered Views diagram

Incorporate social strategy and event management.

A key attribute of MassArt’s culture are the events on campus, both those organized by the school and those organized by community members, such as student-run gallery shows or department-organized talks. The website should incorporate event management and social media experiences in a clear and usable way for all audience members. A solution for easily displaying and organizing events will be a key function of the website. As well, the site should incorporate other social network strategies, such as automated news syndication or leveraging community-generated media to highlight local culture, with intent to create the authentic view into MassArt that prospective students crave.

Deploy a strategy for harnessing site analytics.

Identifying important user interactions and setting benchmark metrics are keys to informing analytic understanding of the target audience’s behavior on the site. The design process provides an opportunity to define and establish strategic points of visitor engagement to generate meaningful metrics in support of MassArt’s marketing and communications goals and web-based initiatives. Examples of visitor engagement points may include signing up for an event on the calendar, requesting more information from the Admissions department, liking/sharing a photo of student work, or giving a donation. Stories of how the user got to that engagement point and how their time spent on the website differs from the average, derived from tools like Google Analytics, can be insightful. The strategy should be coordinated with the Marketing and Communications department’s vision for audience engagement.

Scope of Work and Deliverables

The design and implementation of the new website will incorporate features and functionality to assure current best practices and standards for website design, and accommodate future incorporation of MassArt satellite websites’ features and functionality. The new website must be visually sophisticated and remain faithful to the College’s visual identity system. The new website must be functional, user-friendly, and aesthetically representative of excellence in art and design. As a national leader in design education, expectations for the new website are very high.

It is essential that all of the College’s various stakeholders be involved in the web redesign project. The consultant will be expected to participate in presentations and discussions with staff, faculty, students and others throughout the duration of the process.

Starting with the provided research and analysis of MassArt’s existing website and its needs for the upcoming redesign, the chosen firm should articulate the course of action required to meet those needs.

MassArt recognizes that the consultant must have a solid understanding of the institution, its objectives, its strengths and opportunities, and its competitive environment. MassArt will allow the consultant to review all existing, relevant documents, including the research and analysis deliverables outlined in Phase One (below), marketing materials and plans, visual identity guidelines, and other documents as requested. MassArt will also provide sample content (text, images, dynamic media) from its site upon request from the consultant.

The consultant is expected to provide a project management strategy and plans which includes tasks, schedules, timelines, and pricing, and also incorporates the phases listed below. Pricing should include all fees and out-of-pocket expenses. All proposals are subject to review and approval by the MassArt web team, and to the satisfaction of the Executive Director of Marketing and Communications, the Chief Information Officer, and the President of Massachusetts College of Art and Design.

The launch date of the site is Wednesday, June 1, 2016. The consultant has flexibility in planning the duration of the individual phases, but the launch date is fixed, and any timelines or schedules must ensure delivery of the new website by that date. The MassArt web team understands that the website design and development are subject to changes based on external and internal variables which may be outside of the control of either the consultant or the MassArt web team. However, the consultant is expected to be agile enough to accommodate and incorporate necessary changes to meet the MassArt web team’s objectives by the launch date.

The project is divided into six phases, described below:

1. Phase One: Assessment and Planning

a. Research and Analysis. MassArt, in collaboration with a consultant, has conducted a research and analysis review of the current websites. This review will be completed by July 1, 2015.

b. Needs Assessment.

i. Functional units across the college have been engaged in discussion around specific needs that must be addressed by the redeveloped site.

ii. The consultant is expected to address the needs outlined in the Project

Overview section, above, and engage the MassArt web team, and stakeholders deemed appropriate by the MassArt web team, as required to understand and refine those the needs, and propose solutions.

c. Information Architecture.

i. The consultant is expected to provide a revised information architecture plan to the MassArt web team, which addresses the needs defined the Overview Section, and is subject to approval by the MassArt web team.

d. Deliverables

i. Project Outline. Created at outset, a list of objectives, timetables, meeting schedules and a plan for client presentations and updates, including indications of who will be responsible for each stage of the project. The project outline will also need to define change management protocols and procedures that clearly articulate how the consultant and MassArt web team will deal with change requests to the schedule, deliverables, etc.

ii. Needs assessment, which articulates the College’s business and academic needs that need to be addressed by the new website, and outlines the strategy for addressing those needs.

iii. Information Architecture Strategy document which provides high-level recommendations of how the content is organized, structured and labeled to provide users with an experience which allows them to find the information they need and conduct transactions they wish to perform efficiently and effectively. The plan should include an organization scheme and structure for content, a content inventory of the existing web properties to define and identify the types of content that currently exist, an outline of the taxonomy and metadata strategies to categorize that content, an overview of the personas of visitors and strategies to serve those personas, and an information architecture map, site map or other graphic(s) which demonstrate the proposed architecture.

2. Phase Two: Prototyping

a. The prototyping phase will transform the needs assessment and information architecture strategy into a viable prototype to outline the fundamental for the new website.

b. The consultant will conduct usability and user experience testing and provide evaluation documents as necessary to support the recommended information architecture and navigation. Testing might include card-sorting exercises, mouse or eye tracking, A/B and multivariate tests, conversion path analysis, click-through testing, test scenarios, videos of user sessions, etc.

c. Deliverables:

i. Usability and user experience testing evaluation documents.

ii. Creative Treatment. Story boards, sitemaps, wireframes, templates, color palettes, navigation systems, style guides, design principles and/or other materials that clearly demonstrate a minimum of 3 prototype options. The creative treatment should include mockups of the homepage and all other layouts necessary to support the information architecture, as recommended by the consultant (i.e. homepage, second-tier pages, etc.)

iii. The consultant should strive to demonstrate their ideas by drilling down into the architecture and provide examples that demonstrate how various user personas might navigate to the content they need to find, or complete a transaction.

3. Phase Three: Detailed Design

a. Deliverables:

i. Design Revisions. Upon the approval of one design concept, the consultant will provide 2-3 rounds of revisions based on client feedback and user testing.

ii. Final Delivery. The consultant will present the final design to the client for implementation. The final design should include templates for the home page and all other pages necessary to implement the site as outlined in the information architecture and should be provided in print form and electronic form, as appropriate. Files should include:

1. HTML files

2. CSS files

3. PNG files

4. Layered Photoshop files

5. Any other files necessary for implementation

4. Phase Four: Technical Proposal

a. Deliverables

i. Technical proposal and specification

1. The consultant will provide a detailed technical proposal and specification, outlining the recommended technical solutions which need to be implemented in order to achieve the design specifications.

2. The consultant is free to propose any technical solution which meets the design objectives.

3. MassArt favors open-source solutions and open standards to reduce cost, ensure flexibility and quality, and reduce risk.

However, the consultant may propose proprietary solutions as part of the proposal provided the value proposition is clearly defined and articulated.

4. MassArt favors a solution which requires minimal infrastructure investment in hardware (e.g., software-as-a-service (SaaS) or cloud solutions.)

5. The consultant will review existing technologies MassArt currently uses (e.g., Ingeniux CMS, Trumba calendar system, etc.), and provide recommendations whether those technologies are adequate and can be leveraged to meet the design requirements of the new website, or whether they need be augmented or replaced with new technologies. MassArt takes an agnostic approach to technology, and seeks to implement best-of-breed solutions where possible to meet requirements.

6. The technical proposal and specification will include a timeline for implementation and will include the total cost of ownership, which includes the implementation cost, the cost of technical solutions to be implemented (e.g., software or service licensing, hardware, etc.), support costs, and a projected total cost of ownership over a 5-year period.

5. Phase Five: Implementation, Testing, and Revision

a. The consultant will provide a proposal and plan to implement and test the design and technical proposals.

b. Deliverables

i. The consultant will provide a plan to for implementation, testing, revision of the new website based upon the approved design.

6. Phase Six: Documentation, Training and Launch

a. The consultant will present user documentation and a training plan to train the

MassArt web team and a select group of content managers and contributors on how to use the new website.

i. The plan should include training on how to administer the site, create and deploy templates, create/upload/edit/delete content, implement and update navigation, apply taxonomy, metadata, and tags for appropriate content, and utilize plug-ins/modules to integrate the site with other sources (social media, internal systems, etc.)

ii. The plan should also define and include editorial standards which can be communicated to site content editors, creators, generators or providers to appropriately format content for the new website (to respond to responsive design, etc.)

1. For example, what the appropriate word or character counts for text blocks are, the size and resolution of images, graphics or video, etc.

Phases may overlap where appropriate, and the consultant may propose an alternate strategy for meeting the MassArt web team’s objectives, but they must be made in consultation with, and are subject to review and approval by, the MassArt web team. See the Bidding Alternatives section for further details.

Any alternate proposed strategy would need to include the following deliverables, and document them accordingly.

1. Project Management plan

2. Information architecture

3. Wireframes

4. Visual design

5. Style guides

6. Mock-ups

7. Implementation plans, where appropriate

8. User Documentation and training

9. Technical plan

10. Change Management plan

Design Requirements

The new website will satisfy the following design requirements:

● It will reflect the identity and culture of the institution (high production value, visually compelling aesthetics, etc.) to the highest level of satisfaction of the target audience(s).

● It will provide exceptional usability for target audiences, in terms of navigation, user experience, and the ability of users to find relevant information and conduct meaningful transactions.

● It will provide facile administration of content.

● It will provide functionality to showcase rich art and design media from the MassArt community.

● It will be scaleable, flexible and extensible to accommodate evolving institutional requirements and emerging technologies.

● It will incorporate best standards and practices of responsive web design to assure an optimal viewing experience across devices.

● It will incorporate reasonable integration with social media networks in support of MassArt’s editorial needs.

● It will reflect current best practices and standards in website design.

● It will accommodate future integrations and functional upgrades identified.

Technical Requirements

The new website will satisfy the following technical requirements:

● Compliance with federal and state regulatory requirements regarding web accessibility.

○ Federal Government:

■ Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act, 42 U.S.C. §2000d, which applies to all state agencies, and its implementing regulations (for example, 42 C.F.R. §84).

■ Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act, 29 U.S.C. §794d and its implementing regulations, 36 C.F.R. §1194.22 (Web-based intranet and internet information and applications) and 36 C.F.R. §1194.21 (Software applications and operating systems). Although Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act does not apply to Executive Department agencies, the Commonwealth has chosen to base its web accessibility standards on the standards included in Section 508.

○ State Government:

■ Mass. Gen. L. ch. 151B, which prohibits discrimination against the handicapped in connection with housing and employment, and Ch. 272 sections 98 and 98A, which prohibit discrimination in public accommodations against persons with disabilities. All of these statutes apply to all state agencies.

○ Detailed requirements, guidance and resources available here http://goo.gl/ziVl5G

● Compliance with World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) web Design and Applications standards7 for HTML & CSS, Javascript Web APIs, Graphics, Audio and Video, Internationalization, Mobile Web, Privacy, and Math on the Web, where applicable.8

● It will incorporate information architecture and hierarchy consistent with peer institutions.

7 Web Design and Applications involve the standards for building and Rendering Web pages, including HTML, CSS, SVG, device APIs, and other technologies for Web Applications (“WebApps”). See http://www.w3.org/standards/webdesign/ for details.

8 Compliance with WC3 standards will require validation using the W3C Validator Suite. See https://validator-suite.w3.org/ for details.

● It will incorporate search engine optimization (SEO) best practices, standards and functionality.

● It will work seamlessly with existing or proposed third party vendor functionality, which might include but is not limited to the calendar, digital asset management system, CMS Content Management System, or other internal or external systems.

● It will leverage APIs for the College’s existing information systems to retrieve data, apply applicable formatting and styles, and render it in a WC3 compliant browser, where applicable. For example, it should be able to pull course information from the College’s student information system (Ellucian Colleague) and display according to the design specifications.

● The administrative and content management functionality of the site will support editorial oversight and workflow, including the ability to display unpublished drafts of pages in a staging or development environment to facilitate approvals from various stakeholders.

● It will integrate with and leverage the College’s identity management infrastructure to provide site administrators with to provide granular ability to assign submit, read, write, edit, approve, publish and delete privileges to individual pages by individual users.

● Lifecycle requirement - proposed CMS or other technologies, custom code, or design stylesheets will be planned to facilitate a 3-5 years maintenance refresh cycle.

● The consultant is expected to provide comprehensive technical documentation in the form of reference binders or electronic documents which could be used by internal or external developers to understand how the site is configured, and how it functions.

● It will provide site administrators with the ability to design additional templates for unforeseen, future requirements outside of the scope of the initial requirements.

● It will provide functionality to incorporate or upgrade modules, plug-ins or other solutions required to meet the design specification for the new website, and for unforeseen, future requirements outside of the scope of the initial requirements.

Within this scope, MassArt staff will work to…

● Develop web-specific copy for all pages on the site

● Produce new media featuring student/alumni stories and key programs

● Develop policies and processes for enforcing content standards and workflow guidelines

● Provide the chosen agency with the research and analysis conducted so far, which has driven the constraints and goals presented in this RFP.

Proposal Requirements

A firm's proposal should include the following information:

● Design and Architecture Strategy & Concept: Plan outlining steps the firm intends to take for achieving the objectives outlined above.

● Technical Proposal: Please describe how the firm would approach the implementation process of a design for this project.

● Firm Information, Personnel, and References: Please provide a brief history of the firm and its experience, showing three related projects that exemplify ability to work from information architecture through implementation. Also, please include information on those individuals who would be assigned to implement this project (including any subcontractors), as well as a list of client references.

● Financial Proposal: Describe the overall cost of the project, including a breakdown of costs for individual component tasks, assessments and services that cover one-time, ongoing, variable, consulting and third party costs, plus a tentative implementation timeline that corresponds with each component.

● Contractual Arrangements: Please provide any form or contract that MassArt may be requested to sign as part of the implementation of this project.

Basis of Selection

MassArt staff will evaluate proposals on the basis of these factors:

1. A firm or individual's relevant experience, qualifications and success, as well as the experience of those who would perform the required services;

2. A firm or individual's references from institutions of higher education and/or clients of comparable size, including previous web re-design projects of a similar scope and size;

3. A firm or individual's project management plan, financial proposal and implementation timeline;

4. The quality of the proposal, specifically, responsiveness to the requirements as outlined in this RFP and the adequacy of the information provided; and

5. Factors relevant to the firm or individual's capacity and willingness to satisfy MassArt’s business and academic requirements.

Tentative Schedule The dates listed below are tentative and subject to change by the College.

Schedule of Events for RFP

Request for Proposal issued June 19, 2015

Deadline to submit written questions June 25, 2015 at 3:00

PM EST

Bid addendum issued answering questions July 1, 2015

Bid Deadline July 7, 2015 at 3:00

PM EST

In-Person Finalist Interviews August 4-6, 2015

Anticipated Bid Award August 20, 2015

Schedule for Website Project

Anticipated Start Date September 8, 2015

Site launch Date

June 1, 2016

Contact for RFP Response

Any questions regarding the bid must be submitted in writing to: poconnor@massart.edu

Bids must be submitted electronically by emailing proposals to: purchasing@massart.edu

Your electronic file should not exceed 10 megabytes. Subject line in your email should reference RFP #, Website Redesign for Massachusetts College of Art and Design. No paper or fax copies will be accepted.

Contact Information

Purchasing Department Jim McDaid, Director of Administrative Services 617-879-7960 jmcdaid@massart.edu

Technology Department Patrick O’Connor, Chief Information Officer / Assistant Vice President 617-879-7878 poconnor@massart.edu

Additional Materials

Supporting visuals referenced in this document can be provided on request by the bidder:

1. Existing Site Architecture map – MassArt_Arch_Map.pdf

2. MassArt Web Presence – MassArt_Web_Presence.pdf

3. Audience Balancing diagram – MassArt_Audiences.pdf

4. Filtered Views diagram – MassArt_Filtered_Views.pdf