Ever stared at a blank webpage and thought, “What am I even doing?” Yeah, us too. That’s why we created TheContent Compass—your trusty guide for writing web content that doesn’t drift off into the Bermuda Triangle of Confusion. It’s like GPS for your page builds: keeps you on course, provides tips and latest web news, helps you avoid jargon potholes, and politely reminds you that “Click Here” isn’t an inspiring call to action.
After a productive stretch in Information Technology, the UTC Web Development Team has returned to Communications and Marketing—and they’re unpacking their laptops, caffeine habits, and years of tech wisdom like seasoned travelers coming home from a long adventure.
During their time in IT, the team gained valuable experience in infrastructure, security, and all the behind-the-scenes wizardry that keeps UTC’s technical systems humming. Now, reunited with the storytelling side of campus, they’re blending web tech precision with marketing’s creative spark to deliver faster, smarter, more accessible web experiences.
The reunion has already sparked fresh energy across departments—code meeting content, function meeting flair. It’s less a return and more a homecoming tour, where everyone’s bringing their best skills to the same table.
So, cue the fanfare (and maybe a little confetti): the Web Dev Team is back in Marketing, ready to bridge creativity and technology—one well-coded, beautifully branded webpage at a time.
*Boomer Lesson:The Traveling Wilburys was a legendary 1980s rock supergroup made up of George Harrison, Bob Dylan, Tom Petty, Roy Orbison, and Jeff Lynne. Think of them as the OG collab crew — before Spotify playlists or TikTok remixes and long before “collabs” were a thing.
Byte-Sized Briefs
Students Wanted: Three Open Spots. One Great Team.
The Web Team is looking for three shining stars to join the team as Student Web Content Editors. These behind-the-scenes semi-pros keep utc.edu from turning into a digital attic worthy of Storage Wars, making sure pages stay polished, links behave, and requests don’t drift off into the internet void.
No previous experience? No problem. We’ll provide all the training, plenty of support, and a few good laughs along the way. Plus, it’s a great line for any resumé—nothing says “attention to detail” like helping run a university website.
If you know a student with a sharp eye, steady hand, and just the right dose of perfectionism (the kind who alphabetizes their apps on their phone for fun), send them our way!
A PDF Walks Into a Website…
What’s up with PDFs? It seems like everyone’s got one! During our big website migration, we discovered departments have been uploading PDFs like Oprah giving out cars—“You get a PDF! You get a PDF!” The trouble is, 1) most aren’t accessible (we’re fixing that) and 2) there are just so many of them. Old flyers, outdated forms, 10-page syllabi from 2012… it’s a digital yard sale out there. So, we’re cleaning house! Before uploading your next document, take a quick look at our guide on when to use PDFs, how to keep file sizes small, and how to make them accessible: Uploading PDFs to the Website.
Making the Web So Accessible, Even Your Mamaw’s Screen Reader Is Applauding
Yo, the Web Accessibility Task Force has been out here workin’! We got every www editor trained up in Silktide—so now folks actually know what “alt text” is. No more mystery images named “final_final_reallythisone_108.jpg”.
We also teamed up with the Walker Center and threw down with those Making PDFs Accessible with Adobe Acrobat sessions. Man, the crowd showed up! You’d think we were giving away Beyoncé tickets.
Now we’re coming for blog.utc.edu editors—don’t hide! We just want your sites to play nice with everyone.
And after that, we’ll be checking every third-party thing UTC uses, just to make sure nobody’s out here breaking accessibility laws.
Mark your calendars, folks—on Thursday andFriday nights, November 20-21, 2025, www.utc.edu and blog.utc.edu are getting a little spa treatment. (blog.utc.edu gets pampered on Thursday so we don’t clash with the Chancellor’s Investiture Ceremony on Friday.) We’re talking fresh updates, fewer glitches, and hopefully no one accidentally deleting the homepage. Just remember: anything added to the test site during maintenance will disappear faster than your motivation on a Monday morning.
So, if you’ve been working hard on new pages, save them on the live site or stash them somewhere safe before the 21st. Pro tip: make unpublished pages on the live site, then publish them on the test site after we’re done playing digital mechanic.
Want the full IT maintenance schedule? Go check out the 2025 lineup—it’s like a rock tour, but with more patching and fewer guitars.
The Great Web Roundup: When WordPress Rode into Drupal Country
Well, partner, on October 25, we saddled up and pulled off another big move — blog.utc.edu finally rode into the same hosting sunset as www.utc.edu. After years of livin’ on different ranches (servers, if you’re fancy), these two digital cowpokes are now together at last! Cue the tumbleweed and triumphant harmonica.
Back in the day, WordPress and Drupal each had their own patch of land. WordPress handled the blog posts; Drupal wrangled the main site. But keeping ’em on separate servers was like herding cattle with two different maps…and lots of dust.
So our trusty web wranglers rustled up a plan: move both to the same hosting corral. And boy, did that pay off.
Why We Hitched ’Em Together
Less Wranglin’: One server means fewer updates, fewer rodeos, and less duplicatin’ of effort.
Faster Horses: Shared caching and resources make both sites gallop faster than a jackrabbit on espresso.
Stronger Fort: Centralized security keeps the outlaws (hackers) at bay.
Slimmer Ledger: Consolidation at a lower cost — that’s more gold in the digital saddlebag.
Happy Crew: Devs and editors now ride side by side, makin’ content smoother than Tennessee whiskey.
The Afterparty
Since the move, both sites have been purrin’ like a well-fed mountain lion — faster load times, fewer hiccups, and a whole lot less fixin’. It’s a cleaner, meaner, leaner setup for everyone.
The Big Picture
This wasn’t just movin’ code around — it was a full-on web frontier alliance. One vision, one server, one unstoppable posse.
Next on the trail? go.utc.edu — so saddle up, partner. The digital prairie awaits!
Code, Coffee, and a Whole Lotta Collaboration: UTC’s Open Source Camp Rocks Chatt
The University of Tennessee at Chattanooga sure knows how to throw a camp—just swap the tents and bug spray for laptops and coffee! On November 7–8, UTC co-hosted Open Source Camp Chattanooga 2025 with ChaDUG (Chattanooga Drupal Users Group), turning the campus into a buzzing hive of tech folks, creatives, and caffeine-fueled problem-solvers. Friday’s all-day workshops dove into Drupal, WordPress, and Laravel, while Saturday’s sessions kept the energy high with real-world accessibility demos, friendly banter, and more acronyms than a government memo.
It wasn’t your typical conference—it was part family reunion, part tech jam session. Huge thanks to Chris Gilligan, Weston Gentry, David Wood, Brian Rogers, Steven Shelton, Natalie Wright, and Drew Schurr from UTC and Lee Walker and Bernardo Martinez from ChaDUG for helping make the magic happen. Folks left smarter, connected, and maybe just a little sleep-deprived—but already asking, “When’s the next one?” (Hint: start charging your laptops now—you won’t want to miss next year!)
The Family Tree of Navigation: Sidebar Menus Reveal Their Roots
The UTC website just got a little more ancestral. Our sidebar navigation now proudly shows a page’s “parent” link when you’re viewing one of its “children”—because every good family deserves to stay connected.
Before this update, wandering deep into a department’s pages felt a bit like showing up at a family reunion and forgetting how you’re related to anyone. You could visit “Web Accessibility,” but finding your way back to “Web” required detective work (or a helpful button our Web Dev Team duct-taped in years ago).
Now, thanks to the new “Render parent item” option in the Menu Block’s Advanced Settings, the family ties can be on full display. When you’re on a child page like Web Accessibility, you’ll see its proud parent, Web, perched above it—styled in UTC’s signature dark blue and gold like a polished nameplate in the family tree. (More visual refinements are on the way before year’s end to make navigation even smoother and more accessible.)
It’s a simple change with big benefits: visitors can see exactly where they are, how the pages are related, and how to climb back up the digital family branch without getting lost in the woods.
How to Implement It
While in “Layout” mode, in the first region where you would place the sidebar menu, click “Add block”.
Under “Menus” in the righthand sidebar, add the desired menu as you normally would.
In the next window, open “Menu Levels” and check “Expand all menu links”.
Open “Advanced Options” select your parent menu link in the “Fixed parent item” select box.
Next, check “Render parent item”, then add your block. Voilà!
The Bigger Picture
This update is part of UTC’s ongoing effort to make the website more intuitive, accessible, and user-friendly for students, faculty, staff, and visitors. As the site continues evolving toward the Drupal 11 platform, these improvements help ensure that every click feels more connected and purposeful.
Say It with Pictures… and Words: The Art of Alt Text
You’ve heard the saying, “A picture’s worth a thousand words,” right? Well, not if your Wi-Fi flakes out or you’re using a screen reader. Then it’s worth exactly zero—unless you’ve added alt text, that magical little sentence behind the scenes that makes your image make sense.
Alt text isn’t just about checking the “accessibility” box—it’s about storytelling. It’s what helps everyone, regardless of how they browse, understand what’s going on in your image. Think of it as your picture’s secret narrator.
Here’s how to write it like a pro (and not like a robot):
Say what’s there if it’s important. Got text in the image? Add it. Don’t leave your audience guessing.
Keep it short and sweet. One or two sentences should do it—this isn’t the next Great American Novel.
Skip the “image of…” Screen readers already announce that part, so save yourself the redundancy.
Focus on what matters. Describe what gives the image meaning or context—don’t waste time detailing every blade of grass.
Done right, alt text turns your visuals into a more inclusive story—so everyone gets the full picture, even when the picture’s not there. Examples:
Helpful Alt Text
Alt text: Students outdoors by a river with two students pouring a blue bucket of water into a clear cylinder held out by a third student.
Unhelpful Alt Text
Alt text: Picture of students pouring water from a bucket.
Alt Text: Three students outdoors with a card driving over a bridge in the background with a male student in a yellow shirt and no shoes working with another male student in a gray shirt pouring water out of a blue bucket into a long clear cylinder held by a female student in a pink hoodie.
If you have questions or want to discuss alt text, you can reach out to us for more information.
Editor Spotlight: April Cox
For more than two decades, April Cox, Director of Creative Services in the Division of Enrollment Management and Student Affairs, has played a pivotal role in how the university presents itself to the world. Within EMSA, Cox collaborates with departments across campus to market and promote their programs, events, and student resources—while also designing creative content that inspires prospective students to fall in love with UTC.
Reflecting on her long career, Cox recalls the early days of the web with enthusiasm. “Since the very first website I saw in 1999, we have come a very long way,” she said. “I still remember my excitement when I had the opportunity to help design UTC’s first robust website and later transition into our first Content Management System.”
From those early beginnings to today’s sophisticated online experience, Cox has been instrumental in UTC’s digital evolution. “It’s been a privilege to have a hands-on role as our site has grown, expanded, and evolved—strengthening UTC’s presence in its most visible channel,” she shared.
Her work blends creativity with precision, whether she’s researching how other universities manage their web presence or making a simple edit to correct a typo. “I’m always eager to learn more about our website and to help create a presence that serves prospective students and their families, as well as employees and current students,” Cox said. “Maintaining a website is no small task, but I’ve always enjoyed supporting what I believe is our most powerful marketing tool.”
After 26 years at UTC, Cox finds deep satisfaction in the results of her efforts. “It’s deeply rewarding to see how our collective work translates into a better experience for every visitor,” she said.
Through her dedication, innovation, and passion for communication, April Cox continues to ensure that UTC’s digital presence reflects the excellence, energy, and spirit of the university community.
Whether you’re a seasoned editor or just getting started, The Content Compass is your trusted guide for making every webpage the best it can be.
Feel free to reach out to us if you have any feedback! We look forward to hearing from you. In the meantime, happy editing!
