Check Out Our New Look!

Our very own GIC website has now been upgraded to the Lighthouse Design System!

The goal: To eliminate as many hard-coded accessibility issues as possible while improving functionality and user experience, so we can focus on keeping our editable content accessible.

Our small agency took on the same editorial challenge that our Lighthouse partner agencies are embracing: We took a step back, revisited and re-prioritized our content and navigation, and launched with a slimmed-down version of the site that we can grow out from.

Our first real step: Determine what was absolutely necessary to launch with. This exercise helped us to take an honest look at our content and its layout.

Content Reviewed

We used Google Analytics to determine which services and information were most used, and which weren’t getting much traffic.

Over the past year, people visited our website most often for the Public Meeting Calendar, website maintenance requests, and accessibility guidance (including our blog).

Some of those lesser-viewed pages were removed, and some were merged into other pages. We had intended to weave in new content, including an updated portfolio of our recent work, but we decided to leave that for a later phase of development in keeping with our philosophy of building out thoughtfully.

Content Organized

Next, we drew out a new sitemap, taking into consideration the goals of the entire team. We decided to highlight our most-used services on the homepage for quick and easy access.

We reduced the number of top navigation items to four from the previous seven.

One of those top nav items offers a quick way to access our most-used forms in our new “Submit a Request” dropdown.

We made sure none of the new top items had more than six menu items. Our previous site had one dropdown with eleven choices. That didn’t translate well on mobile devices, and was also flagged as an accessibility concern.

Remember, those using screen readers can’t quickly scan for a menu item- they have to listen to the entire list. Our goal here is to make getting to that destination a little easier for everyone.  

Content Merged

Some important content has found a new, more organized home. Information that had been scattered around our old site has now been collected on our new Collaborative Support Services page.

We’ve also gathered our key maintenance request services in one spot on our new Website Support Services page.

Conceptually, it’s like creating sky lobbies in the higher floors of a skyscraper. The goal is to create places where visitors can organize their thoughts and jump on an express elevator to get them to their destination more efficiently and enjoyably.

Content Eliminated

Some pages we eliminated include:

Web Standards: The information was outdated and no longer relevant to our audience.

Common Look and Feel: This content was also outdated and replaced by the new Lighthouse guidelines.

GIC Blog Feedback Form: We hadn’t gotten a single response, so no problem getting rid of it.
(If anyone does have any feedback, they can still reach out via our contact page!)

Measurable Improvements

The previous GIC site had 58 live pages, and we launched our Lighthouse site with a pared-down 44 pages.

DTI’s contract to use Level Access software allows state agencies to evaluate their own accessibility, and provides an overall score on a scale of 1 to 100. The previous GIC site was getting an 81.
Running the new GIC Lighthouse site that you are currently visiting through the test shows we are now up to 94!

Another test: The free WebAIM WAVE accessibility evaluation tool rates a site’s overall accessibility on a scale of one to ten.

Basically the same results, as the GIC WAVE score went from an 8.6 to a 9.9!

That has been the improvement we’ve seen with all fourteen Lighthouse sites. Here’s a sample of those sites, with the percentage their WAVE scores went up after launching Lighthouse:

Lieutenant Governor Kyle Evans Gay: 9 to 9.9 (+9%)

Office of Veterans Services: 8.7 to 9.8 (+11%)

Delaware Anti-Trafficking Action Council: 8.7 to 9.9 (+12%)

Division of the Public Advocate: 8.5 to 9.9 (+14%)

Open Data Council: 8 to 9.9. (+19%)

But Why Aren’t We Perfect??

The eternal question!

Hall of fame NFL coach Vince Lombardi said: “Perfection is not attainable. But if we chase perfection, we can catch excellence.”

In the case of the GIC site, Level Access has not failed any elements, but it has flagged a couple for review. These include questions about font size as it relates to color contrast. We have reviewed these manually and found that they meet the WCAG 2.1 AA guidelines. So we will thank Level Access for having us double-check and accept the non-perfect score!

However, we will continue to scan our site as new content is added, to ensure that we are actively chasing that unattainable perfection.

Here’s one more quote for you:

“Progressive improvement beats delayed perfection.”

– Mark Twain

And, as always, we are here for you as consultants. Ask us any digital accessibility question you have.

Really- anything! This Accessibility Inquiry Form will be reviewed by the GIC and we will respond as soon as possible.