New Web Site for the World Affairs Council

This one is big. After many months of work, we've just launched our favorite site yet! Check out the new Internet home for the World Affairs Council in Seattle: www.world-affairs.org

Quite simply, the World Affairs Council "links greater Seattle to the world". The Council promotes global citizenship and "creates programs and opportunities for local people to interact directly with leaders, educators, and professionals from around the world."

We are absolutely thrilled to have built the Council's new web site.  In addition to all of the standard power and flexibility offered by Drupal, site highlights include a gorgeous events calendar with many editorial options and a slick interface, tight Facebook and Twitter integration, a smooth editorial workflow that allows the Council's staff and interns to manage content efficiently, and of course the snazzy front page slidepicker that I wrote about earlier.

Events Calendar

The Council organizes, sponsors, and promotes all kinds of events, and there were many requirements for how this section of the site should work. We had fun exceeding expectations in this department, providing a beautiful and functional interface for the calendar and individual events.

Social Media

Social media services are a crucial part of the Council's outreach strategy, so integration with these services was very important for the web site. The site ties in to Facebook and Twitter in a number of ways:

1. The Council's accounts are prominently linked in the site sidebar
2. New content can be Tweeted or posted to Facebook by the Council editors with a check of a box
3. Content can be easily Tweeted or "liked" by site users

Workflow

A big group of people had a hand in creating and editing the web site content, and it was clear from early in the project that an editorial workflow needed to be in place. A large number of interns and staff members create site content, which site editors must review before publishing or sending back for revisions. As always, "there's a module for that" in the incredible Drupal community; we were able to create a flexible editorial workflow system that meets the Council's current needs and will adapt as the Council's web site usage matures.

Slidepicker

Finally, everyone loves the slidepicker on the front page. It's hard not to just sit there and fiddle with that thing! But in addition to the candy-like fun of it, this feature provides portals to the programs that are at the heart of the Council and lets the various site audience groups get where they want to go quickly.

There were many other fun challenges to the project, and we're very proud of where we came out. Most of all, we're grateful to provide this new public face and powerful tool to the World Affairs Council to expand their outreach, improve their online productivity, and better represent their excellent work.