csun.edu (California State University, Northridge)

1) your best guess at intended audience;

• High school students deciding on their college route
• Community college students looking to transfer into a university
• Current CSUN students
• Prospective graduate students
• Locals wanting to attend campus events
• Prospective employees
• Current employees
• Alumni
  

2) usefulness of content;

The first link about CSUN is perfect for prospective students. The most helpful link is academic programs, which leads you to the school/college that you would be working in and allows you to find info. on the application process, the program requirements, faculty and all the pertinent info when you're deciding between programs. I like that at the top of the page there is a link that lists exactly what B.A., M.A. and PhD programs the school offers. I like that the portal to sign in is right at the top of the page (it didn't use to be that easy to find).


3) consistency of design;

Some of the links are not consistent with the campuses main page. For instance, just clicking on academic departments in the center of the page takes you a differently designed page. It's not too distracting though, and it is not the case with all the links. Those pages with different designs are still fairly intuitive

4) ease of navigation

The design is simple enough, and pleasant enough, and the headers stand out enough, that even though the website is conveying a lot of knowledge, it is still pretty easy to navigate. There are lots of routes to get to the same page as well, which is always helpful.

P.S. I'm not so sure about the close up of the woman across the top of the home page, I can articulate why, but it's a bit silly. I think they should change that to a more professional look.