Mars Hill college publishes the following publications:
From These Stones alumni magazine
Happenings on the Hill parents newsletter
InsideMHC e-newsletter
Monday Memo campus briefing e-mail

Web Server Guidelines
The purpose of the Mars Hill College Web server is to support the mission of Mars Hill College through the development of Web pages. These pages will focus on the areas of recruitment, admissions, academic programs, advancement, student development and the general promotion of Mars Hill College.
World Wide Web pages produced with Mars Hill resources and retained on the Mars Hill Web server constitute a form of official college publications, and must be approved by the Mars Hill Office of Communications.
Programs or departments wishing to develop a Mars Hill Web page are invited to propose their ideas to the communications office, which will examine:

• the page's consistency with the mission of the college
  
• the appropriateness of design
  
• the technical feasibility.

Upon approval of the proposal, the communications office will work closely with the individuals or offices during the development of the page.


The following guidelines have been approved and established for the Mars Hill Web server and Mars Hill Web pages:

• The official College Web server is established and its operation is overseen by the Office of Information Technology Services. No other server may be used for pages pertaining to Mars Hill College without written permission of the Mars Hill communications office.
  
• Only pages about Mars Hill College and Mars Hill College-sponsored programs will be allowed on the server. Personal Web pages are not supported, except as noted below.
  
• Web pages whose duration of interest is long-lived and/or widespread are the types of pages that will be uploaded on the Web server. (For example, a new major, minors offered by departments, admissions information, telephone numbers for college offices.)
  

Official College Web Pages

Campus identity
Since many of our users will find your site through a search engine and not the college's homepage, it's important to provide Mars Hill College identification. You can achieve this by using campus templates, including the name "Mars Hill College" in the header or navigation section of your web pages, and using the college seal or logo.

Provide contact information
Provide contact information throughout your site—at least an e-mail address on every page. On your front page include a link to a complete postal mailing address, key phone numbers (with area codes) and key contact people in your organization.

Create accessible sites
Use a design that will be accessible to the largest possible audience. For a quick overview of accessibility guidelines see Section 508, Electronic and Information Technology Accessibility Standards.

Navigational links
Include links to your department or unit and the campus main page. Create a consistent navigational scheme on all pages of your site. Make sure the titles of your links are visible at all times, not just on mouse-over.

Keep content up-to-date
Check your content on a regular basis to ensure its accuracy. Avoid including content on your pages which is the responsibility of another department. Link to their pages rather than duplicating the information on your site. Check these links often.

Keep pages small
Try to keep your pages under 65K. (Add the file size of all your graphics and html to determine the page size.) Avoid long scrolling pages (like this one) on main pages, and overly large images which increase download time

Don't advertise
Don't advertise commercial sites, products, or services on your campus site. Text, links, and corporate logos can be included on a page when referring to corporate sponsors. Don't include any form of text or graphics which promotes or encourages commerce with commercial companies on the campus mhc.edu domain.

Copyright
Comply with all copyright laws for content—text, images, multimedia presentations, etc. that were created by others. Know where all your content and image files originated. Using content from any source, even a campus site, without permission from the creator, can violate copyright law.

Searchable sites
Include a search feature in your site. The Office of Communications has chosen to use Google on the campus site. We encourage you to use this free service.

Use meta tags
Meta tags can greatly improve the usefulness of your site by improving the ability of search engines to index your page. To create good meta tags for descriptions and keywords, put yourself in the place of the audience as you create your tags—what words would they use, what are they looking for? The description tag can be similar or the same for all pages on the site. The keywords tag should reflect the general theme of the site as well as information specific to that page or section.

EXAMPLE:
<META name="description" content="Campus Information Technologies Services">
<META name="keywords" content="Email, passwords, accounts, computing, telephone, network, phone, computers">

Personal Web Pages
All on-campus users are provided free web space for departmental and personal use. When using university computer systems:

Stay "personal" not "commercial"
This means that the content and links on your site must not express or imply that you are profiting in any way. For example, links using commercial advertisements are prohibited. Linking to, or selling your own products or services, is prohibited. This includes hidden links to include search engine traffic to a commercial site.

Content must be "personal" not "organizational"
The personal web space you are provided is not intended for use by any organization, profit or nonprofit. For example, posting your club or church group membership roster or meeting schedule is prohibited.

Keep your content "legal"
Be sure your are in compliance with federal, state, and local laws governing content and copyright. For example, most content and imagery on the web cannot be copied or used without permission, even on personal pages. Keep in mind you can be held liable for what you say on your site.

Be aware of your personal safety
When you post content which details your address, phone number, daily travel schedule or other personal details, you may be subjecting yourself to unnecessary safety risks. Avoid including such information.

See also Graphic Standards