I love the idea of looking back in time and seeing how things have progressed (or turned for the worst). The assignment Way Back in Time embraces this idea with the web. I decided to use the Mary Washington homepage website. I am quite a legacy at this school. My mother, grandma, aunt, many cousins, and close family friends have all attended this University. Some even attended with the school was all girls or called Mary Washington College.

Using the Way Back in Time Machine website I collected many screen shots of how the webpage has progressed through the years starting in 2004. It has changed many times since then. It even changed from 2011 to this year! I also noticed very small changes in design. In 2008 I took two screen shots because the Centennial celebration logo changed within a few months.

I think the biggest change was in the design. It started off very simple, not giving many links or options and then developed into a lot for a webpage. I love all of the options it gives now, but at some point it can get overwhelming. The colors of the page also started off as just white and blue, then developed into adding yellow and different shades of blue, then back to blue and white, and this year it has more of a grey and white theme.

I believe the website has changed for the better, however if too many more things are added it could be for the worst. It started off simple (probably a bit harder to find things) and developed into having more options on the front page. This probably developed due to the increasing student population. More students means more activities and things going on that people want information on. These days, the first place people go to get information is the internet. A working simple to use website is key for a University. UMW has done a great job with modifying the webpage to embrace the changing times.

2005

2004

November 2008

March 2008

2007

2009

2010

2011

2012