Nyree Cannady

Web Writing and Design

Professor Bill Broun

December 6, 2019

Throughout this project I have learned a lot about how to design a successful website. As

well as, effectively write online content. I decided to do a usability study on the Philadelphia

Sheriff’s office for my service learning project. My goals for this project was to test my abilities

to do a proper usability study that effectively accessed the state of the website I chose. If I did

this correctly I would be able to point out any improvement to the site that was necessary. Also, I

wanted to make the information this site provided more accessible to the people of the

community that may not be able to visit the owners of the site in person. I also wanted to tell the

employees of the Philadelphia Sheriff’s office that their site provided a great help to their

community because it was so easy to understand. It took some planning and many emails, calls,

and in person communication to make this study happen.

First, I used my connection at the sheriff’s office to be able to use them for this project. I

emailed my old supervisor Devon Floyd. She is the current head of the Human Resources

department. She replied to my email the same day and I was able to start my project

immediately. My next task was to decide who my participants would be and to contact them too

see if their availability lined up with my own. I contacted my brother, my roommate, my friend

who graduated, and my mother. While doing my project I went on break for a few days because

of Thanksgiving. I visited the HR department in person to have an in person chat about the

project. I learned many things about what was going on about what had happened in the

department while I was gone.

 To continue, there were many criteria that went into why I chose who participated in my

project. I decided that I wanted the age range for this project to be from early 20s to older people.

I believe that this age range was the right choice because early 20 year olds uses the internet

more often than most people. Also, the elderly cannot leave their houses as much as others can,

so they may not be able to visit the sheriff’s office in person. As a result, an easy to use efficient

website would be the best option for them to receive much need information or make their

opinions known. I chose my mother because she grew up in Philadelphia and before the internet,

so she can provide representation for the older group. Next, my brother was born in the city, but

now he spends most of his time at college in Atlanta. As a result, he has experience with both

states’ law enforcement, giving him a unique perspective. Then, my friend Doug is from outside

of Philadelphia, thus making him a completely unbiased opinion of the site. Finally, I chose my

roommate Glenn because he rounds out the age group. Many of my questions that I asked them

were also based of my first experience with the website. Thus, making them effective on their

inquiry about the difficulties and functionality of the parts of the website.

Further, the PowerPoint on the dos and don’ts of web design really helped me with the

finer details. It provided me with effective information to make my site more inviting. For

example, I chose a white background because even though it may be a little bright when first

viewed, many colors contrast white, so it makes picking a font color easier. Additionally,

speaking of font, I chose black because it is the easiest to see on a white background, it goes with

the color scheme of the webpage, and it’s just the simplest choice. Moving on, I chose to use

drop down menus because of the design I saw used on one of the examples used for a website

presentation of a service-learning project. For the participants of the study, the creator of the

page gave each one of them their own tab on the menu. Personally, I believed that it made the
menu cluttered, since everything looked bunched together. The drop-down menu function allows

for me to give each person their own page, while also allowing for a cleaner more organized

look.

Potential effects my study will have for the organization are not going to be that

influential in my opinion. I may have done a study on the website, but it was not like the site

needed that much improvement. Most likely, the effect this project will have is that it will

encourage the department to check up on the site every so often, in order to keep it updated and

efficient. For the community this study will hopefully help them by making the website easy for

them to navigate. To be honest this project is the first of its kind for me. I think that my questions

may be a little superficial in their attempt to be effective. However, I do believe that they where

aimed at the issues because they were designed after the issues, I encountered during my first

visit to the site. My communication with my contacts could have also been better. I know that

they were always busy, so they answered the emails that they were able to answer. And those

answers were a great help. I think that I did an okay job making a usability study for my first

attempt. If I ever make another one in the future, I will have a better understanding of what to do,

and hopefully make it better.

To conclude, this project really helped me understand the difficulties of designing a

website. Just because something looks good, does not mean that it functions well. You need to

have both in order to make a website that captures the audience’s attention and never lets it go.