Creating Project-Specific Websites.

The School of Public Health is committed to supporting research at all levels and strives to be an ideas-first institution where faculty members take the lead on promoting their research to the world. Our faculty members are involved in hundreds of research projects and are often motivated (and sometimes required) to develop websites to showcase their work. These websites feature the work of specific projects or specific research groups and can be excellent sources of news and information for our students, our colleagues, and the world at large.

The purpose and functionality of websites for individual research projects vary, and we want to ensure that our researchers have the flexibility to design their sites in whatever way best suits their needs. We have developed the following list of resources to help researchers successfully build and manage their own websites. To build a new website, there are two options: build and host the new website within the BU WordPress environment, or host your site outside of BU. The details associated with each option are described below.

Staying within BU

The University has recently developed website templates that are a good fit for many projects. These new templates are fully responsive to tablets and phones as well as desktop computers or laptops. Staying within the BU environment has the added benefit of BU security, and there is no direct cost for using the BU WordPress environment or for hosting the website on BU servers. If you choose to build your website within the BU environment, you should use the Responsive Framework Theme and proceed as follows:

  • If you are building a new website or if your existing website is not currently housed at BU and you want to transfer it to the BU environment, your site administrator should fill out a request form for a new BU website.
  • If your site is already hosted at BU and you want to upgrade using a template, your site administrator should submit a help ticket to request that the current site be cloned to the staging server. Please note that cloned sites are completely separate from the original; we therefore recommend freezing (or minimizing) updates on the original site during this process (described here).

If you do not have a website administrator on your staff, you have several options:

  • Send a staff member to BU’s free WordPress training, which is offered throughout the year. WordPress is a very user-friendly content management system (CMS) and easy to learn. You can see the training schedule here.
  • Hire SPH’s Biostatistical and Epidemiology Data Analytic Center (BEDAC) to act as your site administrator. The BEDAC staff can help you request and set up a new site or migrate an existing one. They can also address more complex issues, including databases, content development, and website maintenance. Contact Joe Palmissano for more information.
  • Hire an outside designer or freelancer to work within the managed BU WordPress environment. If you choose this option, your external designer will to be hired through the normal contracting and procurement process and will need a guest account. IS&T is working to identify at least one pre-approved vendor for working on sites in the managed BU WordPress environment.

Please note that your site will have a www.bu.edu domain, not a www.bu.edu/sph domain. We will, however, make sure the SPH website is appropriately linked to your BU site. Please contact Anna McKay regarding linking to your website.

Hosting your site outside of BU

If you prefer to have more design flexibility, you can hire an outside vendor or the BEDAC to build, host, and/or maintain your website outside of the BU environment (via the normal contracting and procurement process). Please note that if you hire an outside contractor your site will not have a www.bu.edu domain. Websites built by the BEDAC will have a www.bumc.bu.edu domain. We will, however, make sure the SPH website is appropriately linked to your external site. Please contact Anna McKay regarding linking to your website.