It may only be 6 months old, but as of May 31, the SNCC Digital Gateway is sporting a new look. Since going live in December 2016, we’ve been doing assessment, talking to contemporary activists and movement veterans and conducting user testing and student surveys. The feedback’s been overwhelmingly positive, but a few suggestions kept coming up. Give people a better sense of who SNCC was right from the homepage, and make it more active. Connect SNCC’s history to organizing today. As one of the young organizers put it, “What is it about SNCC’s legacy now that matters for people?” So we took those suggestions to heart and are proud to present a reworked, redesigned SNCC Digital Gateway. Keep reading for a breakdown of what’s new and why.
Today Section
The new Today section highlights important strategies and lessons from SNCC’s work and explores their usefulness to today’s struggles. Through short, engaging videos, contemporary activists talk about how SNCC’s work continues to be relevant to their organizing today. The nine framing questions and answers of today’s organizers speak to enduring themes at the heart of SNCC’s work: uniting with local people to build a grassroots movement for change that empowered Black communities and transformed the nation. Check out this example:
More Expansive Homepage
The new homepage is longer and gives visitors to the site more context and direction. It includes descriptions of who SNCC was and links users to The Story of SNCC, which tells an expansive but concise history of SNCC’s work. It features videos from the new Today section, and gives users a way to explore the site through themes like voting rights, the organizing tradition, and Black Power.
Themes
Want to know more about voting rights? Black Power? Or are you not as familiar with SNCC’s history and need an entry point? The theme buttons on the homepage give users a window into SNCC’s history through particular aspects of the organization’s work. Theme pages feature select profiles and events focused on a central component of SNCC’s organizing. From there, click through the documents or follow the links to dig deeper into the story.
Navigation Updates
To improve navigation for the site, we’ve changed the name of the History section to Timeline and the former Perspectives to Our Voices. We’ve also moved the About section to the footer to make space for the new Today section.
Have suggestions? Comments? We’re always interested in what you’re thinking. Add a comment or send us an e-mail to snccdigital@gmail.org.