Comments | cmprince: RGSBers: Why do Rose-Hulman's press releases suck?

cmprince

RGSBers: Why do Rose-Hulman's press releases suck?

Aug 29, 2006 17:37

Are any of you as disappointed as I am in the quality of the press releases coming out of Rose lately? The writing is awkward and usually has bad grammar. It's like nobody proofreads them before they go out. And don't get me started on how lame the web site's been the last decade or so. How else would you improve Rose's communications efforts? ( Read more... )

Comments 6

anonymous August 29 2006, 21:56:56 UTC

Can you give some examples? -jrc

cmprince August 29 2006, 22:45:32 UTC

Well, what set me off was the latest press release. The whole first paragraph is a mess. What does Christmas have to do with anything? What is an "advanced computer laptop"? But just about any of the other press releases show similar poor writing.

The website hasn't changed in -- I don't know. A very long time. For as little information as there is on the homepage itself, it's awfully cluttered: two seperate navigation bars, a hard-to-read "highlights" box inside another sort-of box, and a stupid looking animation across the top that just makes for a distraction. Oh, and putting the phrase "Rose-Hulman is one of the nation's top..." may as well have after it "No! Really! We are!" The website as a whole is ugly and difficult to read.

Maybe I'm nitpicking, but I expect better out of a school claiming to seek greater recognition.

kirinqueen August 29 2006, 23:37:15 UTC

You're right about the press releases looking like they weren't edited; ouch. I'd guess from some of the errors that they're written by non-native English speakers too, except that might be giving them too much credit. ("This year's laptop ... is the HP ... Workstations"? Come on.)

I'm with you that the website should look better, even if that is a relative "nit" in the whole being-a-good-school scheme. It is, after all, a school that educates computer scientists--many of whom who, the last I checked, know how to engineer a web page!

heelgrabber August 30 2006, 23:48:35 UTC

well, they may know how to build one, but that doesn't mean that CS folk have any clue about designing a good one. that's almost like saying anyone who speaks is a linguist. ;)

kirinqueen August 31 2006, 00:27:45 UTC

Okay, but seriously, any one of you rgsb (for lack of a better term) guys could make a better website than the one that currently exists.

design charles_hanon August 30 2006, 13:41:04 UTC

I think part of the problem is that the site is either designed by students or staff at the school, not anyone who is thinking "outside the box" or, heaven forbid, someone with a real art or design background. Maybe that would help.

I agree about the press releases-- they often seem to be written by an engineer, not a writer.