Reading text on a monitor can be uncomfortable. To make it easier for our students, faculty and staff to use our website, I have added a new feature: typography options. In the right hand corner, underneath the main menu, you will now find four letter As. Each one will change the basic typography of the Rowan-Cabarrus website.

The four options are standard, large, extra large and dyslexia friendly. The standard option will display all main content fonts in the standard font sizes for the Rowan-Cabarrus website. The large option increases the main content fonts by two pixels. The extra large option increases the main content fonts by four pixels.

To benefit our students, faculty and staff with dyslexia, we have used the British Dyslexia Association guidelines for creating more readable text wherever possible. If you choose to use the dyslexia friendly option on the Rowan-Cabarrus website you will notice several changes to the display of text. Most prominently, all body text and menus are presented in a font face that increases readability for users with dyslexia. If your browser supports web fonts, you will see the font Lexia Readable. Traditionally, most guides recommend using Comic Sans. However, Comic Sans because it was designed to emulate comic book fonts and not to be a dyslexia font, can feel informal or childish to dyslexic users. Lexia Readable was designed specifically for dyslexic users and is recommended by several dyslexia associations, including the American Dyslexia Association. It features all of the benefits of Comic Sans with a more professional appearance. Additionally, using the dyslexia friendly option will increase the font size and remove all instances of italicized text and replace it with bold text. To read more about typography and dyslexia, visit the British Dyslexia Association’s dyslexia style guide.

Is there a way that we could help improve your experience on the Rowan-Cabarrus website? Submit feedback to the webmaster.

Update

November 11, 2011

The web version of the programs of study is back online.  Thank you for being patient while we worked to improve our programs of study pages.

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Last week, our programs of study was taken down, due to errors in the listings of required courses. Unfortunately, this means that the only accurate record of our programs of study on the website is the very large RCCC Catalog PDF file. We understand that this is an inconvenience for our students, especially during registration. However, our top priority is ensuring you don’t register for the wrong classes because you were given incorrect information about your program. We apologize for the inconvenience of using the cumbersome PDF.

We are currently reviewing the programs of study to make sure that they will provide you with accurate information. As soon as we can, we will re-post the more user-friendly listing of the programs of study. Thank you for bearing with us as we strive to provide you with only the most accurate information possible!

The new Rowan-Cabarrus website is a drastic change from our old website. The new site is more accessible, more usable and more current. One of the ways I made the site more usable was to move the three most popular items for students, Blackboard, WebAdvisor and student email, to the top of every page.

However, this means that there is no longer a single landing page for student email. This means that if you click on a link for student email, you will go directly to your student email and not have to click through more pages before getting where you want to be.

The old website required students to click on the dropdown menu and find the email option, then click on the student email button on the gateway page, then scroll to the bottom of the student email page, then click on the student email button again, then sign in. Now, no matter where you are on the new Rowan-Cabarrus website, you can access you email in one step.

Yet, our analytics have shown that many of our students are still going to the old address for email or haven’t yet noticed the email link at the top of the page. So, to help out, I have added an animated arrow to the 404 — page not found — webpage to show you where the new email link is located. So, if you need the little extra help, I hope you got where you needed to go. If you already found the email links, you can go to the 404 page just for fun to see it.