Website_Redesign-RFP_FINAL_23DEC2015.pdf

MWCC Website Redesign, page 1

Mount Wachusett Community College Web Redesign Project

1. PROJECT OVERVIEW

The purpose of this document is to provide interested vendors with information to enable them to prepare and submit proposals to assist Mount Wachusett Community College (MWCC or the college) with the redesign of the college's public website and digital/inbound marketing efforts to positively impact student enrollment.

Mount Wachusett Community College recognizes the importance of the main website, mwcc.edu, in meeting the needs of the college’s goals and objectives, as well as having meaningful interactions with its constituencies.

It is one of the primary communication vehicles between the college and its audiences, and is often the “first look” at the institution by prospective students and their families. The current website does not accurately convey the rich variety of academic programs and credentials, the exceptional civic engagement experience provided, the campus commitment to sustainability, the breadth of our student services, strong transfer partnerships with 4-year institutions, our commitment to teaching & learning excellence, and the integral role the college plays in the North Central Massachusetts region.

Mount Wachusett Community College’s current site was launched in 2012.

While the site met many of the needs of our target populations, it does not reflect today’s best practices of an online experience; including less than adequate responsive and mobile friendly functionality across all browsers and devices.

ABOUT MWCC

MWCC is an accredited, public two-year institution serving 29 cities and towns in North Central Massachusetts. Our 269-acre main campus is located in Gardner, Massachusetts. Satellite sites are located in Devens, Fitchburg, and Leominster. Courses are offered during the day, evening, on weekends, and online.

The college offers over 70 associate degree and certificate programs, adult basic education/GED programs, education and training for business and industry, and noncredit programming. Our students enjoy many support services and resources such as a Center of Excellence for Veteran Student Success, a Fitness & Wellness Center, an Academic Support Center, the Center for Civic Learning and Community Engagement, a 555-seat Theatre at the Mount, the Garrison Center Childcare Facility, Green Street Cafe, Barnes & Noble College Bookstore, and the LaChance Library.

Mount Wachusett Community College is known for its innovation in continuing education programming, K – 12 partnerships, and sustainability initiatives. The main campus includes an academic building, the Arthur F. Haley Academic http://mwcc.edu/support/childcare/ https://iconnect.mwcc.edu/group/mycampus/gs-cafe http://mwcc.bncollege.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/BNCBHomePage?catalogId=10001&storeId=44057&langId=-1 http://mwcc.bncollege.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/BNCBHomePage?catalogId=10001&storeId=44057&langId=-1 http://mwcc.edu/lib/

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Center, with fully-equipped classrooms, laboratories, studios, library and theatre. Haley building renovations occurring now include:

• a new visitor entrance

• multi-purpose room

• a new academic advising center

• refurbished student hub (Commons)

• increased accessibility to the Fine Arts Wing

A new Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) wing, currently under construction, will provide advancements for students and faculty:

• Eight new classrooms and laboratories

• Four lab prep rooms

• 24 new faculty offices

• A student study space

• Enhanced audio/visual equipment

• Wireless capabilities

New laboratory technology includes:

• Projection microscopes with 60” flat screen monitors

• Atomic absorption and infrared spectrometers

• Nuclear magnetic resonance equipment

• Laser physics analysis lab

The $41 million project includes a 44,000 square-foot addition, a new 2,300-square-foot greenhouse and renovations throughout the existing Arthur F.

Haley Academic Center. MWCC received $37.9 million in state capital funds for the project, as well as a $500,000 grant from Massachusetts Life Sciences for laboratory equipment.

In addition, the MWCC Fitness & Wellness Center offers a gymnasium, athletic field, running track, racquetball courts, pool, weight room, and fitness center.

MWCC’s facilities are accessible to persons with disabilities.

2. DESCRIPTION OF CURRENT WEBSITE

The current site replaced a home-grown, hard-coded HTML site that was launched in 2007. Recognizing a need for a dynamic and more user-oriented web presence in 2011, the Marketing & Communications Office began an 18-month project to overhaul the website in a multi-phases and inclusive process that included the implementation of a CMS (WordPress) as well as a decentralized approach to content management.

While WordPress is mostly found to be “user-friendly” by our approximately 40 editors of varying levels of web savviness, it currently lacks some

MWCC Website Redesign, page 3 scalability, permissions granularity, and ability to utilize multiple “front-end look and feel” options.

However, our biggest back-end issue is currently two-fold: keeping editors engaged with the website, and consequently, keeping content up to date, accurate, engaging, and focused on consistent brand messaging and enrollment goals.

Another challenge is that much of the current navigation of the site was built to reflect how the college is structured rather than a user’s perspective.

For example, if a visitor wants to find out about our Health Information Management program, s/he has to know that academic department falls under the School of Health Professions, Public Service Programs and Social Sciences. Therefore, our visitors are very much dependent on the search function to find the information they are seeking rather than a more natural navigation process. With this in mind, the development of new, simplified, site architecture is viewed as a crucial improvement.

The college has updated the homepage twice subsequent to the 2011 overhaul, to attempt to align with college needs and a changing landscape of user experience best practices

The college’s marketing department studies the Google Analytics of mwcc.edu on a regular basis. Through this research, we have learned that a growing number of our users (35 percent for the 2015 YTD vs. 30 percent for the previous 8-month period) visit the site on a mobile device. Therefore, the implementation of a more sophisticated responsive site is critical.

WEB CONTENT

Content is managed at the department level with requests for new functional components such as layout changes or photo galleries submitted to marketing.

All significant changes to the website are managed through a workflow process through marketing.

MWCC DIGITAL ECOSYSTEM

Information is included in this RFP to provide a sense of the college’s digital ecosystem and interconnections between the various systems and platforms, so that the vendor can propose strategies for better presentation (or integration, where possible) of the College’s other online systems.

These include, but are not limited to:

• CourseLeaf academic catalog & student handbook

• faculty/staff and student intranet portal, iConnect o A CRM built on SalesForce o WebConnect (Self Service Banner) o Haven o Transit o AwardSpring o Blackboard for course content and online teaching and learning resources

MWCC Website Redesign, page 4 o Atomic Learning for online tutorials o DegreeWorks

• 3D Cart for non-credit course registration

• Banner, our student database

• Active Data Calendar, our online campus event calendar

• CareerCoach

• Library databases

• SharePoint

• WebDAM digital asset management

• NobleHour

• FinAidTV

• $ALT

ONGOING TECHNICAL SUPPORT

The current mwcc.edu website is primarily supported by college personnel, with additional technical resources paid on a freelance basis for technical or other assistance. These resources are also employed when necessary to augment internal MWCC staff. Bidding firms should provide detailed recommendations of the optimal method by which the newly redesigned website will be maintained by MWCC personnel over time.

Describe in detail the following:

• Physical location of hosted servers (private cloud or public cloud) if recommending a new hosting solution

• Disaster recovery and/or failover planning

• Level of access that will be available to MWCC personnel (IE root level server access, limited write access, read-only access, etc.)

• Post go-live support plan

TECHNICAL ENVIRONMENT

The current mwcc.edu website is hosted offsite by ServInt under a “Flex VPS” plan, which allows for hardware scalability. The website is running on a virtual server running the LAMP stack (Linux, Apache, MySQL, and PHP).

The site runs on the WordPress CMS with dynamic content such as forms, directory lookup functions, and class search capabilities that utilize a database backend.

In the RFP response, bidding firms, if proposing an alternate to our existing hosting solution, should describe the optimal technical environment for the proposed solution. Include in that description the following details:

• The type of server(s) used (specify physical or virtual)

• The Web server engine (IIS, Apache, Tomcat, etc.)

• The underlying language used to generate dynamic content (.net, asp, jsp, php, etc.)

• The method in which static/user maintained content would be served through the Web server (IE. stored html files, dynamically retrieved

MWCC Website Redesign, page 5 from the WordPress database, etc.)

o If an alternate CMS is recommend, the number of licenses available

• The method in which dynamic content would be integrated into the website

CONTENT MANAGEMENT SYSTEM

While MWCC is not looking to replace the current CMS (WordPress), we are open to exploring options if other CMS options better align with our goals and objectives. Ideally, we are looking to replace, customize, or heavily augment the existing WordPress theme (Thesis) to achieve an outcome of a more user-friendly interface for content managers, more flexibility in content presentation, easier integration of rich content like slideshows and widgets, stronger workflow options, and easier adaptation of theme styling CSS to offer specific areas of the college customized front-end look and feel. The response to the RFP should include recommendations for improvements to our content management system, detailed information regarding building a custom WordPress theme, and your experience working with WordPress.

Selected bidders will be asked to provide a real demonstration of the augmented or custom-built theme where the college can directly experience:

• Adding content including text, images, videos, etc.

• Adding pages and functionality

• Workflow and authorization

• Flexibility of interface

3. PROJECT DESCRIPTION

While it is certainly important to provide our visitors with a rich and engaging interface that conveys the essence of MWCC, we understand that this project must yield much more than just a new "look and feel". The website has become more than a simple "brochure site." It has become a vital resource for the entire college community. It is expected that this project will involve all areas of the institution and will require reworking content and site architecture. The chosen vendor will facilitate inter- departmental cooperation to design a website that can accomplish the following objectives and goals:

OVERARCHING STRATEGIC OBJECTIVES

1. Drive enrollment: optimize user experience; specifically function as a admissions inquiry-generating engine; promote enrollment goals such as applying online, visiting campus for a tour, and filling out an inquiry form

2. Prominently reflect the institutional brand and concisely communicate our unique selling proposition

3. Implement inbound marketing to “feed the funnel” of the newly improved website as an enrollment tool

4. Highlight our ongoing campus improvements and commitment to both STEM and Humanities

5. Highlight and promote the over 70 program offerings and awareness of

MWCC Website Redesign, page 6 the breadth and quality of programs across all schools and departments

6. Demonstrate that MWCC provides a premier student-centered educational experience, which develops the “whole student,” preparing them for success in and beyond the classroom; nurture a strong sense of community and service to others

7. Highlight the college’s deep embeddedness in our community;

communicate our economic impact in the region

PROJECT OBJECTIVES

• Conduct user research and usability testing—this site must be user focused

• This project should be approached from a content strategy perspective first, navigation and design, second

• A fully responsive, mobile first approach should be taken

• Develop an entirely new site architecture, based on content strategy and the user research, that anticipates visitor needs

• Develop a cohesive, template-driven site that allows more flexibility than the existing site

• Recommend and, upon approval, implement, manage, and report on an inbound marketing campaign which can include, but is not limited to: email, PPC, remarketing, search, video pre-roll, etc. to promote new website as an enrollment tool

• On-board an email marketing/drip campaign service such as Pardot to support enrolment initiatives and fully articulate with a Salesforce-based CRM solution; include this in pricing details

• Build on the college’s established brand (promote the institution)

• Direct visitors to important information and desired content quickly

• Provide easy access to web-based systems (see list above)

• Address and correct current issue with providing content in other languages, especially Spanish

• Inform extended community members of news and events

• Provide means to obvious "follow through" (call to action) on each page

• Primarily attract prospective students and their influencers, secondarily address employees, donors and regional leaders

• Engage visitors with dynamic content (video, social)

• Communicate complex transfer information in a clear, concise format

• Develop and implement a comprehensive back-end conversion tracking system within Google Analytics and provide staff with adequate training; set up automated reporting based on college needs

• Implement a new, easy to maintain, WordPress theme that includes better workflow, permissions, and utilization of rich media

• Provide redline review capabilities that note the page revisions as part of the workflow/authorization package

• Avoid redundant or duplicate links and minimize navigation sections

• Avoid orphan pages

• Content editors should be able to develop simple, online dynamic forms that tie to a “registration” or “for more information feature”

• Asset management that clearly organizes and stores images, PDFs, documents, etc. by department

• Develop an alternate streamlined homepage that can be quickly launched

MWCC Website Redesign, page 7 during emergency situations to reduce loading wait time

• Search engine optimization

• Fully ADA compliant as well as design with excellent user experience for any site visitor with any disability or impairment

• Campus alert system recommendations; Emergency notification functionality across the entire site designed to accommodate interface with College’s emergency messaging system, currently Blackboard Connect

• Social media integration/engagement/blogging capabilities to provide additional information, dynamic content and functionality

• Multimedia capabilities

• Include tracking and other remarketing options to support the college’s marketing efforts

• Integration of the existing news and event content management system

• RSS-feed capability

• Carry-over and improvement of our current dev and test environments to publish pages for preview

• SEO-focused content development trainings

• Content editor trainings

• Ongoing support and technical maintenance

• Help the college community take ownership of the website, and understand the important role they play managing their content

• Separate from the response to this RFP, bidding firms should provide a plan for providing ongoing support for this website, that is, an outline of an ongoing maintenance agreement including estimated costs, for a three-year time period.

• Periodic reporting on inbound marketing campaign components, social engagement, online conversions

TECHNICAL IMPLEMENTATION

Bidding firms should describe in detail the technical development and deployment of the new mwcc.edu website. In the response discuss the following in detail:

• Assessment of our current hosting; coordination with that vendor

• The technical method that will be used to move the site to a production/live status

• The cutover plan from the current mwcc.edu site to the new site

• Firms should supply a sample technical project plan identifying specifically the tasks that will be required by MWCC IT and Marketing staff during the implementation and deployment phase.

VENDOR TEAM RESOURCES

In addition to providing top-notch technical talents to this project, the vendor’s team must include these skills and experiences:

• Project manager

• Content strategist

• WordPress theme programmer

• Designer

• Copywriter

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• Photographer

• Developer

• ADA compliance specialist

• User research/usability testing specialist

• Brand specialist

• Experience with higher education enrollment process

Bidding firms should outline how they will meet these needs.

MWCC RESOURCES

Although the college’s Executive Council, Division of Academic Affairs, and tactical Web Team will be directly involved, the following positions are the primary team members:

• Director of Marketing & New Media, Sarah McMaster

• Web & New Media Specialist, Brett Moulton

• Director of Strategic Enrollment Management, Scott Farris

EXPECTATIONS

Through extensive on-campus research, usability testing and analysis, knowledge of industry standards, and frequent interaction with the college’s primary team leaders, the vendor will design, develop, install, and test a newly designed public website for the college. The site must provide consistent navigation, layout and styles in a manner that is user-centric and intuitive.

Over the past year MWCC has embarked on an initiative to assess, clarify, strengthen and promote its brand. The new website must build upon this work and support further advancement of the institution. The college appreciates that satisfying the needs of our existing and prospective students, parents and other influencers, as well as community members and alumni is key to the future success of the institution. Therefore, the primary role of the college's website must be to serve the needs of these audiences.

It is imperative that college website is accessible to everyone. By utilizing principles of universal design, all website elements must achieve cross-platform and cross-browser compatibility, W3C and WAI compliance and ADA compliance while strictly adhering to Web standards (HTML 5, CSS3, JavaScript, XML, etc.). Webpages that require JavaScript, CSS or other client-side technologies must degrade gracefully with minimal loss of functionality.

Placement of images and graphics should support and enhance both the content and overall message. Individual webpages should print cleanly to standard letter size paper and support future implementations of print-on-demand functionality. Use of Flash is not preferred; multimedia technologies should not impede access to the content. The content should be presented in such a way as to allow the template to be easily changed (re-skinned).

The college's homepage is the entry point to our web presence for the vast majority of our non-campaign-driven traffic. Therefore, it is imperative that this entry point:

• Clearly and concisely present key targeted actions for engaging

MWCC Website Redesign, page 9 prospective students and influencers in the enrollment funnel

• Present easy navigation based on user priorities , needs, and perceptions; avoid jargon or reflecting internal organizational silos or office structures

• Demonstrate the vibrancy and energy of our campus and student activities and resources, promote academic programs as our “product”

• Address user behavior of current MWCC students using/searching the public-facing website to locate campus services content that exists inside their intranet portal (iConnect); recognize and highlight that this content also serves as a selling point for prospective students

We firmly believe that it is important to provide consistent layout and navigation across all college webpages, but we also understand that some areas of the college may serve unique audiences and those webpages must reflect the individual personality of each of those areas. The vendor will collaborate with MWCC project leaders to identify these areas and include unique variations of the Web templates intended to appeal to these audiences.

4. PROJECT PHASES

It is expected that this project may be accomplished in the following phases.

Proposals should address everything outlined in the project description, and include anticipated timeframes, cost, suggestions for cost savings, and proposed formats for each phase.

Phase 1: Assessment and Planning

• Comprehensive discovery with stakeholders; focus groups and/or workshops with:

• Marketing & Communications

• Office of Admissions

• Enrollment Management Council

• Current Students

• Prospective Students

• Needs analysis (propose a strategy for research and consultation with campus community)

• CMS and theme assessment

• Content strategy that includes a site audit describing the strengths and weaknesses of the current website and suggesting what content is needed and how it should be structure for our target audiences

• User research and usability testing

• Assessment of goals, audiences, existing technologies, functional requirements, and development of a preliminary site plan

Phase 2: Mock-ups/Site Architecture

• Wire-framing

• Three to five prototypes with demo of functionality

• Technical/implementation specifications

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Phase 3: Detailed Design and Coding

• User acceptance BETA test plan

• Detailed design and coding

Phase 4: Content Development

• Provide a detailed plan for gathering information, photos and other assets (maps, graphics, charts, etc.) and an estimate for copy writing and SEO training for institutional content managers; and a proposal for training content liaisons on content submission process.

Phase 5: Site Development

• CMS theme programming and installation

• Finished site with all templates, source code

• Technical documentation

• Custom programming (Flash files, etc.)

• Usability test plan

Phase 6: Testing and Training

• Usability Testing and Adjustments

• Maintenance training and documentation

• Cut-Over/Beta Test Plan

Phase 7: Implementation

• Migration plan

• In-bound marketing deployment

5. DELIVERABLES

It is expected that at various points throughout this project the vendor will produce the following tangible documents, files or services:

DETAILED PROJECT PLAN

• Name, contact info and qualifications of project manager

• Names and qualifications of developers and designers assigned to project, along with crucial team members

• Project timeline

• Discovery process

• Detailed project budget outline costs for each of the project description items

• Site audit

• Needs assessment

• Description of the college's role/deliverables

• List of involved parties

• Meeting schedule

• Web content needed (text, photos, files, etc.)

• User acceptance/usability testing plan

• Template development (must work with project leaders)

• Migration plan

• Identification and "training" of content providers/liaisons

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• Create departmental Web maintenance schedule

• Basics of writing for the Web training

• Explanation of processes

THEME

• Rationale for theme functionality and elements

• Adherence to established college style guide

• Ability to be modified

LAYOUTS

• A minimum of six page layouts

• Variations for site and/or institutional hierarchy

• Variations for medium (Web, mobile, print, etc.)

• Form templates

SOURCE FILES

All files used to create webpages, templates, images, or other elements associated with this project shall be delivered, and all copyrights transferred to MWCC prior to project completion. This includes, but is not limited to the following types of files: HTML, PHP, Javascript, CSS, Microsoft Word, PDF, Photoshop, TIFF, JPG, and Flash.

DOCUMENTATION

• All usability testing data and assessments

• Documentation file(s) explaining all delivered elements

• Code must be well commented with references to separate documentation

• PSD files must contain notes with references to separate documentation

• Style guide outlining proper display of content

• Design guidelines for third party integration solutions

• Maintenance schedules

• Documents to be used for training

• Meeting minutes

6. VENDOR INFORMATION

In addition to addressing the specifics outlined in this document and consideration of the Conditions outlined below, proposals must also include the following details about your company:

• Company name

• Location(s)

• Description of company

• Description of the type of services you provide

• Company Philosophy or Mission Statement

• Total # of designers, developers, etc.

• Avg. experience level of designers, developers, etc

• Description of facilities, equipment, physical resources

• List of current projects, as well as the scope and status of each project

• Financial statements

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• Disclosure of complaints, current or pending actions, legal or otherwise

• Disclosure of possible conflicts of interest

• References

• Portfolio of similar projects (live sites, completed within the past three years, and a brief explanation of the project)

• Signed Creative Rights Agreement

7. CONDITIONS

Mount Wachusett Community College will not be liable for any costs incurred by respondents in the preparation and production of a proposal or the costs of any services performed prior to receiving approval of the agreement from the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. All proposals and materials submitted in conjunction with the proposals shall become the property of Mount Wachusett Community College for use as deemed appropriate, respecting all copyrights.

1. Mount Wachusett Community College reserves the right to modify the requirements of this RFP after its release. All vendors will receive written notification of any modification to the requirements of this RFP. If any modifications make compliance with the original Procurement Timetable impractical, Mount Wachusett Community College will adjust the timetable accordingly.

2. Vendors who submit a proposal in response to this RFP may be required to give an oral presentation to Mount Wachusett Community College. This shall provide an opportunity for the vendor to clarify or elaborate on the proposal, but shall in no way change the original proposal. Mount Wachusett Community College shall schedule a time and location.

3. All finalists will allow a small group of college administrators to perform a site visit (if desired) to the main location that will be handling the account.

4. By submitting a proposal, the vendor agrees that s/he will not make any claims for, or have any right to, damages because of any misinterpretation or misunderstanding of the specifications, or because of any misinformation or lack of information.

5. The successful vendor will be notified by the Mount Wachusett Community College purchasing office by telephone and confirmed by letter. A contract will then be negotiated with the successful vendor. The contract will, among other provisions, incorporate at least this RFP and the successful vendor's proposal.

6. Mount Wachusett Community College is an affirmative action/equal opportunity employer and does not discriminate on the basis of race, color, national origin, ethnicity, gender, disability, religion, age, veteran status, genetic information, gender identity or sexual orientation in its programs and activities as required by Title IX of the Educational Amendments of 1972, the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990, Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, and other applicable statutes and college policies. The College prohibits sexual harassment, including sexual violence.

Inquiries or complaints concerning discrimination, harassment, retaliation or sexual violence shall be referred to the College’s Affirmative Action and/or Title IX Coordinator, the Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination, the Equal Employment Opportunities Commission or the United States Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights.

7. Each successful bidder agrees to indemnify, save harmless and defend Mount

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Wachusett Community College, its trustees, officers, employees and agents from and against any and all claims, demands, actions, debts, liabilities, costs, judgments, and attorney fees, directly or indirectly, arising out of the performance of the activities of said successful bidder under the contract.

8. Each successful bidder is an independent contractor and not an agent of the college and shall not, for any reason whatsoever, represent itself as an agent of the college.

9. Mount Wachusett Community College reserves the following prerogatives:

• To accept or reject any or all proposals in part or entirety

• To correct any arithmetic errors in the proposals

• To waive or modify irregularities in proposals received after notification to the vendor

• To change any dates specified for the review and selection process

• To negotiate a payment schedule as part of the award of the contract

• To request additional information or written clarification of vendor response

10. Omissions, inaccuracy or misstatement may be sufficient cause for rejection of the proposal.

11. Mount Wachusett Community College reserves the right to approve, reject, or cause to be replaced any or all vendor staff assigned to this project. Vendors must further agree to have all proposed vendor team members interviewed and approved by the college.

12. Vendor must dedicate sufficient staff and other resources as required to meet or exceed the mutually agreed upon implementation schedule.

13. Vendors agree to provide evidence of appropriate insurance protection prior to start of work. Appropriate insurance protection shall be deemed to be the coverage outlined in Contractor’s Compensation and Liability Insurance, as stated below.

14. Subcontractors

• Except for vendors designated by the college, the vendor must include a list of subcontractors in their proposal. Said statement must contain a description of the portion of the work which the proposed subcontractors are to perform/provide and any information documenting that the proposed subcontractors have the necessary skill, integrity, experience and financial resources to provide the service in accordance with this Request for Proposal.

• The vendor shall have sole responsibility to the college for the acts or defaults of said subcontractors and of such subcontractors’ officers, agents and employees, each of whom shall, for this purpose, be deemed to be the agent or employee of the vendor to the extent of its subcontract.

• Except for subcontractors designated by the college, all subcontractors must be approved by the college. The vendor shall be fully responsible for the administration, integration, coordination, direction, and supervision of all its subcontractors and of all work. No subcontractor shall perform services at the college until the insurance requirements of this Request for Proposal have been met, and satisfactory evidence has been provided to the college.

• The vendor shall execute with each of its subcontractors and shall require all subcontractors to execute a written agreement which shall bind the latter to the terms and provisions of this Request for Proposal insofar as such terms

MWCC Website Redesign, page 14 and provisions are applicable to the work to be performed by such subcontractors.

15. By submission of a proposal, the vendors must certify, and in the case of a joint proposal each party thereto must certify, as to its own organization, that in connection with this proposal the prices in the proposal have been arrived at independently, without consultation, communication, or agreement, for the purpose of restricting competition, as to any matter relating to such prices with any other vendor or with any competitor.

16. All proposals and attachments become the property of the college.

17. The selected contractor will be required to assume responsibility for all services offered in his proposal. Further, the college will consider the selected contractor to be the sole point of contact with regard to contractual matters, including payment of any and all charges resulting from the contractor.

18. Employees of the vendor shall conduct themselves in a professional manner while on campus or while communicating with employees of the college.

Mount Wachusett Community College reserves the right to request removal of a vendor's employee from this project if said employee is deemed to be acting unprofessionally or performing below expectations.

19. Throughout this project it is possible that confidential information may be disclosed by either the college or the vendor. Both parties agree to respect the sensitivity of this information and agree not to share this information without permission.

20. All content, concepts, designs, findings, and files developed by the vendor for the college shall remain the property of the college.

CONTRACTOR'S COMPENSATION AND LIABILITY INSURANCE

Contractor shall, at all times, at its own expense, obtain and carry comprehensive liability insurance, property damage insurance and Workers’ Compensation insurance of adequate amounts, naming the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, and Mount Wachusett Community College as additional insured.

Contractor shall keep such insurance in force for the duration and term of this agreement. All certificates of Insurance or Evidence of Insurance must contain a thirty (30) day written notice of any cancellation, change, or termination of coverage. The insurance required shall be obtained from insurance company(ies) licensed to do business in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, and have the following minimum limits:

TYPE DOLLAR LIMITS

Contractors Liability (including protective and Contractual Liability)

$1,000,000 combined (bodily injury and property damage) single limit-each occurrence $2,000,000 aggregate

Automobile Liability (owned and Non-owned vehicles)

$1,000,000 CSL – each occurrence

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Workers Compensation and Disability Massachusetts Statutory Benefits

8. PROPOSAL PROTOCOL AND CONDITIONS

No public disclosure or press release pertaining to this RFP, review process, or award shall be made.

Proposals must include a current financial statement and a statement indicating whether or not their company has been profitable for the three prior fiscal years (and parent company if applicable).

LENGTH OF CONTRACT

The term of the contract(s) shall commence on or about February 1, 2016, and continue until the project is completed, provided performance, service, and quality have been and continue to be acceptable to the college. The successful bidder will sign the contract, which will incorporate this RFP and Attachments hereto, and the bidder response to the RFP.

EVALUATION CRITERIA

All responses will be evaluated by the professional staff of the marketing and communications division with input from college leadership. Our evaluation will be based upon the vendor’s ability to meet Mount Wachusett Community College’s requirements. Each proposal will be evaluated against specifications outlined in this RFP. Award of this contract will be made to the bidder offering the best value response to the goals and performance requirements outlined in the RFP. The RFP will be the first step in an agency evaluation process. Upon completion of the initial review and evaluation of the proposals, and based on the bidders responses, selected respondents who best meet the college’s criteria for service, ability, pricing, systems, and special programs as detailed in this RFP will be invited to make a presentation at the college. The presentations, limited to one hour per bidder, will provide an opportunity for bidders to clarify their proposals through mutual discussion and understanding.

This Request for Proposal is designed to obtain comprehensive information from each vendor so as to enable Mount Wachusett Community College to determine which vendor is best able to provide Web design and development services in compliance with the terms and conditions of the contract. After considering such information, a determination will be made of the vendor’s financial and operational ability to provide service to Mount Wachusett Community College. Only proposals from responsible vendors, as determined by the college, will be considered. Proposals from vendors will be evaluated on the basis of the criteria detailed in this RFP. Other criteria may include: price, including the cost of ongoing support services; experience in working with higher education clients; the general reputation of the firm; quality of the references provided; qualifications of the personnel assigned to work on the project; demonstrated understanding by the bidder of conducting the work as required by the scope of services and technical recommendations; number of page layouts; bidder’s functionality, performance, flexibility, and ability to

MWCC Website Redesign, page 16 meet Mount Wachusett Community College needs and timetable; plan for providing ongoing support for this website, including estimated costs, for a three year time period; attention to detail and ability to demonstrate follow-through; design philosophy and ability to demonstrate expertise with website hierarchy.

SINGLE CONTRACTOR’S AWARD

This RFP will award a single contract to complete this project only and does not imply any further project awards from Mount Wachusett Community College.

INSTRUCTIONS FOR SUBMISSION OF RESPONSES

Bidders must acknowledge understanding and compliance with each section of this RFP. If the bidder’s document conflicts with this RFP, the RFP’s language takes priority. This is a closed-bid submission. Bids will be opened and examined according to the timetable set forth in this document. Bidders will not have the opportunity to amend bids once they are submitted. If a bid is not complete, it will not be accepted. Further, if the contract is awarded and then discovered to be incomplete, that award will be rescinded.

Bids must be submitted BEFORE the posted deadline and will not be accepted after. Bids must be bound in some manner (three-ring, stapled, pressure-plate, etc.) and not submitted as loose pages, whether in an envelope or folder pocket. Electronic submissions, including faxed responses, will not be accepted. Bids are to be delivered via UPS, FedEx, USPS, or hand delivered and clearly marked WEB REDESIGN PROJECT c/o Sarah McMaster, Mount Wachusett Community College, 444 Green Street, Gardner, MA 01440.

Bidders will submit six (6) copies of the proposed bid, with one (1) copy on an individual flash drive. Any bid that does not specifically address the RFP will not be considered a valid bid-response.

TIMETABLE

Please note that this is an anticipated calendar and may be subject to change.

• Release of RFP: January 4, 2016

• Questions period ends: January 11, 2016

• Q & A posted: January 25, 2016

• Bid Deadline: February 1, 2016 at 3 pm

• Invited bidder presentations: week of February 15, 2016

• RFP Anticipated Award: March 11, 2016

All work outlined in this RFP is expected to be completed no later than January 1, 2017.

COSTS FOR PROPOSAL PREPARATION

Any costs incurred by contractors in preparing or submitting a proposal shall be the contractor's sole responsibility.

DISQUALIFICATION OF PROPOSALS

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Mount Wachusett Community College reserves the right to consider as acceptable only those proposals submitted in accordance with all requirements specified in this RFP and which demonstrate an understanding of the scope of the work. Any proposal offering any other set of terms and conditions contradictory to those included in this RFP shall be disqualified without further notice.

A contractor shall be disqualified and the proposal automatically rejected for any one or more of the following reasons:

• The proposal shows any noncompliance with applicable law

• The proposal is conditional, incomplete, or irregular in such a way as to make the proposal indefinite or ambiguous as to its meaning

• The proposal has any provision reserving the right to accept or reject award, or to enter into a contract pursuant to an award, or provisions contrary to those required in the solicitation

• The contractor is debarred or suspended

• The contractor is in default of any prior contract or for misrepresentation

ADDENDA TO THIS RFP

MWCC may need to issue one or more addenda related to this RFP. Such addenda shall be posted at www.COMMBUYS.com. It is the sole responsibility of prospective contractors and other interested parties to familiarize themselves with the web site and visit it regularly during the RFP process for updated information or addenda related to this RFP.

RIGHTS RESERVED

MWCC reserves the right to award in part, to reject any and all proposals, in whole or in part, and to waive technical defects, irregularities and omissions if, in its judgment, the best interest of Mount Wachusett Community College will be served. Should the college determine that only one bidder is fully qualified, or that one bidder is more highly qualified than the others under consideration, a contract may be negotiated and awarded to that bidder.

FINAL CONTRACT

The agreement, if awarded, shall be governed and construed in accordance with the laws of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, which include but are not limited to the items identified in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts Standard Contract Terms and Conditions (OSD Forms are available at http://www.mass.gov/osd). Attached forms must be completed and signed by applicant. Mount Wachusett Community College intends to use this RFP and the successful proposal as a basis for the agreement.

INSPECTION OF PROPOSALS

Proposals may be available for public inspection upon notice of award and shall be available for public inspection after the contract is signed by all parties.

BIDDER QUALIFICATIONS

http://www.commbuys.com/ http://www.mass.gov/?pageid=osdmodulechunk&l=1&l0=home&sid=aosd&b=terminalcontent&f=osd_forms&csid=aosd http://www.mass.gov/?pageid=osdmodulechunk&l=1&l0=home&sid=aosd&b=terminalcontent&f=osd_forms&csid=aosd http://www.mass.gov/osd)

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All proposals should include the following items for verification of the bidder’s qualifications:

• Business Reference Form, found at the end of this RFP

• Resume of the person or persons who will handle the account

• A table of organization for the company

CONTRACT INVALIDATION

If any provision of this contract is found to be invalid, such invalidation will not be construed to invalidate the entire contract.

RFP TERMS AND CONDITIONS

The terms and conditions of Mount Wachusett Community College (sections A to G), specified below, should be reviewed carefully to ensure full responsiveness to the RFP. The anticipated contract will be, in form and substance, consistent with applicable policy and regulations of Mount Wachusett Community College and the Commonwealth of Massachusetts statutes and regulations regarding the creation and execution of such contract. The failure of any respondent to receive or examine any contract, document, form, addenda or to visit the sites and acquaint itself with conditions there-existing, will not relieve it of any obligation with respect to its proposal or any executed contract. The submission of a proposal shall be conclusive evidence and understanding of the Mount Wachusett Community College's intent to incorporate such terms and conditions into the contract.

Purchase Terms Where a term or condition contained in this RFP differs from a term or condition set forth in the state contract, the terms or conditions of the state contract shall prevail.

Additional Terms and Conditions No additional terms and conditions included with the proposal response shall be evaluated or considered and all such additional terms and conditions shall have no force and effect and are inapplicable to this proposal.

• Customer Payment and Privacy Protection Conditions—responses should certify compliance and/or company policies and procedures regarding the following.

o PCI-DSS Compliance—presently in effect, any merchant processing, storing, and transmitting customer credit card information must show evidence of being PCI compliant. Please submit a Certification of Compliance with your submission.

o PA-DSS Compliance —effective July, 2010, any payment application sold, distributed or licensed to a third party must be PA-DSS compliant. Please identify your firm’s plans for compliance in your submission.

o “Red Flag Rules” —effective November 1, 2009, any third party vendor of the college that handles, stores or transmits personal identifying information must comply with federal trade Commission’s Red Flag Rules. Please identify your company’s Red Flag Administrator and policies related to this regulation.

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Please note: any submission that does not address these conditions will be deemed to be incomplete and subject to disqualification from consideration.

PRICING

Quoted pricing shall remain firm for the entire term of the contract.

EXCUSABLE NON-PERFORMANCE

The vendor will use its best effort to provide satisfactory and uninterrupted service as described in the RFP. The vendor will not be responsible or in default for any failure of service arising from an act of God, civil riot, war, restrictions imposed by governmental authorities, or other causes determined by Mount Wachusett Community College to be beyond the vendor’s control.

CONTRACT TERMINATION

If the contractor persistently disregards the laws, ordinances, rules, regulations or orders of any authority having jurisdiction, or otherwise is in substantial violation of a provision of the contract documents, or the college deems the services provided to be unsatisfactory, then the college may, without prejudice to any right or remedy and after given the carrier thirty (30) days written notice, terminate the employment of the carrier. The college shall be obligated only for those services rendered and accepted prior to the date of Notice of Termination.

CONTRACT RENEWAL

The contract may be renewed upon the same terms and conditions, provided that the parties agree on pricing terms. The vendor shall no later than thirty

(30) days before the expiration of the contract provide written notice of its intent not to renew the contract or of any changes to pricing in may require.

EMPLOYEES

All workers performing services shall be employees of contractor and shall not under any circumstances be considered employees of Mount Wachusett Community College. Contractor shall provide and be responsible for all required services and benefits with respect to its employees, including but not limited to worker's compensation and unemployment insurance.

EQUAL EMPLOYMENT OPPORTUNITIES REQUIREMENTS

In entering into any contract resulting from this RFP the contractor agrees not to discriminate against any employee or applicant for employment because of race, sex, color, religious creed, national origin, and/or ancestry. The contractor agrees to post in conspicuous places notices to be provided by the Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination with respect to the Fair Employment Practice laws of the Commonwealth, which are herein made of this contract reference.