Longevity at MIT Admissions: Student blogs open undergrad admissions since 2007
How often do you get an incurable desire to change an important website page simply because you’ve been looking at the same thing for years? And years. In this case, for at least 15 years.
Curiosity took me back to my Link of the Week archives to see if any of the original selections from 2007 (the first year for Link of the Week picks) were still active today. Remarkably, several were. Including the undergrad admissions entry page at MIT.
My note from 2007: “Blogs from students and staff dominate the first admissions page as Web 2.0 continues to change the future face of college and university websites.”
In 2022…
The unusual feature, of course, was opening admissions content with student voices. Can’t say how many there were then but today there are 12 easy-to-scan blogs available, all with recent June and July postings. Eleven have at least 1 comment. The highest has 10 and others have 8 and 9 so far. That’s quite good in a world where far more people read blogs than comment on them or share them. Total comments: 60 as of this visit.
And so congratulations to the folks at MIT undergraduate admissions for not changing for the sake of changing. If anything, leading with student voices is a more important marketing feature than it was 15 years ago in 2007.
Speed on mobile…
Google PageSpeed Insights measures the MIT admissions page time to first view on a mobile phone at a very fast 1.8 seconds. Alas, time to full interactivity jumps to 13.6 seconds.
The first change for faster download speed again this week: “Serve images in next-gen formats.”
Website Carbon Calculator…
Thanks to Gerry McGovern and his efforts to reduce “world wide waste” for the referral.
MIT has work to do here: “This web page is dirtier than 89% of web pages tested.”
See the carbon use details for MIT undergrad admissions and test your own website pages at “Website Carbon Calculator.”
Follow the Link of the Week…
See how MIT undergraduate admissions has been consistent for 17 years at “MIT Admissions.”
Recommend a future Link of the Week
Always eager to get recommendations of websites that dare to be different… or just do something ordinary in a special way. Write a comment with link here or send me the link at bob@bobjohnsonconsulting.com.
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