Bigelow Cooperative Daycare

Website Proposal – Overview

Any enterprise’s website should be visually appealing, informative, and easy-to-use. These goals are supported by a website that is up-to-date and compliant with current internet standards and protocols. The Bigelow Cooperative Daycare first designed its website in 2012 on a template that no longer meets its needs, and is no longer compatible with its web hosting platform. This proposal is the product of discussions with the Executive Committee, the Web and Technology Committee, and Dawn Lorino, the Director of Bigelow. It recommends a course of action: to re-design the website to meet Bigelow’s specific needs right now, and create a plan to update the site as needed over the long term.

Project Initiation

As a member of the Bigelow community—my daughter Camille is in Rainbow 1—I lent my time to assist on the Web and Technology committee. I soon found out that the website had not been updated since the COVID-19 pandemic, and had not been redesigned since it was first created in 2012. Instead of waiting for another parent to take the lead, I convened the committee to discuss the daycare’s web and technology needs. While the committee was ready to make recommendations on how to improve the existing website, we agreed that revamping the website was a time-consuming effort that required professional attention.

Pressing past this first meeting, I took the time to track down all the technical information needed to update the text of the existing website. However when I tried to make any changes I discovered that the site could not be updated and its supporting infrastructure was defunct.

About me

I am educated as an architect and designer, first studying architecture at UC Berkeley in Berkeley, California. During college I learned how to build websites, and designed webpages for exhibitions at the Berkeley Art Museum. This lead to a job in New York for Oven Digital, and a portfolio of projects for the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA). My first job out of college was for the webdesign firm Bottle Rocket, also in New York, where I designed websites for clients as diverse as Kraft Macaroni and Cheese and the National Basketball Association (NBA). I later pivoted to architecture and worked as a physical model-maker and graphic designer for Robert A.M. Stern Architects (RAMSA) before matriculating into graduate school at the Yale School of Architecture. After a series of jobs in architecture, I returned to school at MIT for a PhD. Since then I’ve primarily worked in academia, while maintaining a small design practice focused on graphic media—print, digital, and decorative. I enjoy making websites in particular and keeping current with web design trends and technical mechanics.

Project Deliverables

  • Update website infrastructure to a fully-supported, up-to-date file management system (WordPress)
    • Remove old files from the server which take up extra space
  • Redesign the look, flow, and organization of the site
    • New front page with easy-to-identify components
    • High-resolution photography showcasing happy children
    • Bright, warm colors appropriate to a daycare
    • Templates for main pages with large feature images
    • Custom color palettes for each template
    • New website header, menu, and footer with easy-to-find information

Suggested Additional Services

  • Create a custom WordPress theme
    • modify the back-of-house infrastructure to better suit Bigelow’s specific website
  • Marketing
    • Create new webpages that showcase teachers and facilities
    • Add an “apply now” button to the home page
    • Optional call-to-action feature for new fundraising campaigns
    • Create an FAQ page for prospective parents
  • Parent-ready pages
    • Create pages where parents have easy access to needed information
      • Enrollment and permission forms
      • Committee descriptions
      • Links to Google Calendar
  • Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
    • Optimize key words, etc. for better visibility on search engines like Google

Long Term Maintenance

  • Plan Monthly or Quarterly Updates
    • Identity a committee or staff member to liaise regarding content updates
  • Plan Annual Reviews of web hosting services
    • Reconsider pricing options for domain name registration and hosting
  • Consider ways to better leverage website
    • Create committee-specific pages, for example, or web-based permission forms
  • Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
    • Update as needed to maintain high visibility
  • Privacy Options
    • Options exist to add private logins for individual parents or user groups

Fees

For the design and development of the Bigelow Cooperative Daycare website—all of the items mentioned in Project Deliverables plus the premium customization of the Suggested Additional Services—the fee is $2000.

For the Long Term Maintenance of the site, the fee is billed hourly at a rate of $50/hour.

These costs are slightly below the standard price for a custom website built for a private enterprise.

Next Steps

Moving forward, I will begin work on the website with an estimated completion time of early-to-mid January, due to the intercession of the holidays, and depending on how quickly high-quality photography can be secured. I am happy to meet with interested parties to review the site and discuss your specific needs and goals during this initial rollout.

Thank you for your time