Title: UC Berkeley Graduate Division
URL: https://lineacreative.com/projects/uc-berkeley-graduate-division/
Published: 2022-11-28 10:21:14
Last modified: 2025-07-08 09:13:08
---
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Case Study

# UC Berkeley Graduate Division

## Improving the web user journey through a compelling brand story.

UC Berkeley’s Graduate Division has a tremendous job: it serves over 13,000 students
participating in 120+ graduate degree programs.

It provides a vital support system for prospective and admitted students, from their
initial graduate school research to their graduation day.

Its team touches on every point in a graduate student’s journey, like admissions
discovery, fellowships, professional development, academic progress, and degree 
milestones.

## Services Provided

 * Audience Discovery
 * Design
 * Web Development
 * Content Strategy
 * Accessibility
 * Long-Term Support

## Our Approach

### The Challenge

When the UC Berkeley Graduate Division team approached us, they were dissatisfied
with their website. It was disjointed and improperly organized across 3200+ pages,
making it difficult for site visitors to find what they were looking for.

The team understood they were in significant need of strategic design and content
organization that could better achieve two goals: to attract new graduate students
and guide current students.

The new website also needed to tackle website accessibility issues. Their existing
website was scoring well below the university’s measurement system requirements,
and quality assurance would need to be woven into the development of the new website.

### The Solution

Our team knew that the key to improving the website’s design and content organization
had to begin by studying the website user’s journey. To achieve this, the project
kicked off with a series of discovery activities led by our team.

As we began the design phase, we knew we needed to lead the user intuitively through
the website, following a cohesive thread of exploration. We decided the best approach
was to find a compelling brand story that would carry the visitor throughout the
pages.

Referring back to our audience discovery, we focused on the unique story of the 
Graduate Division’s role at the best public university in America, and its commitment
to building programs where diversity, equity, and inclusion can flourish.

### Key Actions

Worked with faculty and leadership to imagine and articulate a vision for the website
through a guided sitemap and design workshops.

Conducted a series of user interviews and surveys to learn more about the user experience.

Wrote a discovery brief to guide our next steps.

Built a dynamic database that pulls information from the central UC Berkeley programs
catalog.

Set up crossdomain tracking and GA integration.

Migrated and consolidated the supporting websites into a WP Engine account.

Identified and performed a technical audit of the existing pages to ensure that 
we would improve website accessibility.

Performed some of the content adjustments to save time on their internal staff and
student resources.

### Results

The completed website launched in 2021 with a more streamlined design and sitemap
organization.

The content celebrates UC Berkeley’s unique position as a top-ranked institution
for graduate learning, where students from diverse backgrounds – especially those
from underrepresented groups – belong and thrive.

The website’s improvements have resulted in measurable changes.

Improvement was also measured for website accessibility, where our team’s tactical
approach resulted in **a 36% increase in the site’s accessibility score** (per Siteimprove)**.**
A follow-up project is planned to continue PDF and Word document accessibility remediation.

## See the Work

![](https://lineacreative.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/11/SS-Graduate-Division-1.
png)

## Project Journey

 Start

 Finish

 1.  Discovery
 2.  a. 1. Vision Statement
     b. 2. User Interviews & Surveys
     c. 3. Accessibility Assessment
     d. 4. Discovery Brief
 3.  Design
 4.  e.  5. Sitemap
     f.  6. Wireframes
     g.  7. Homepage Mockups
     h.  8. Secondary Mockups
     i.  9. Content Strategy
 5.  Development
 6.  j.  10. Task Refinement
     k.  11. Database Integration
     l.  12. Content Migration
     m.  13. Feature Build
 7.  Analyze
 8.  n.  14. Analytics Integration
     o.  15. Cross Domain Tracking

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