Last Updated: Monday, July 31st, 2023
The following document is a summary of many federal, state, University System of Georgia, and Georgia Tech laws and polices that we must adhere to when creating content for websites. We have also included Ivan Allen College of Liberal Arts' additional requirements where applicable.
There is a separate Design Requirements for Developers document that you should review if you are planning to build a completely new website or do a notable rebuild or redesign of an existing website.
This document is in no way an exhaustive list of all possible laws and policy requirements, but rather attempts to bring the most important points together in one place. It is your responsibility to review all applicable policies and laws and make sure your work is in compliance with them.
Questions about this document may be directed to the college's web developer.
Drupal Content Management System
The majority of our unit (College, School, Project Center, etc.) websites are powered by the Drupal Content Management System and all of our Drupal sites are currently running on Drupal 10. If you have responsibility for such a site and are not familiar with Drupal 10, you should review our Drupal 10 training materials. The first link on that page takes you to our own training guide for our college customized version of Drupal. The other links offer additional generic Drupal training if you want to go further in learning about how to use Drupal.
Accessibility
Accessibility is the process of making electronic materials perceivable and usable by people with disabilities. Materials (including documents, videos, websites, discussion forums, etc.) are accessibility compliant when they have been structured according to widely recognized specifications.
With Georgia Tech receiving federal funding, all colleges, schools, research centers and other departments and divisions of the institute must adhere to Section 508 accessibility standards with their websites and other online materials, which requires the use of WCAG 2.1 Level AA specifications.
Please review the College Web Accessibility Primer for detailed information on how to ensure that your web content meets accessibility requirements.
For a more thorough introduction to the concept of accessibility and its importance in the university environment, please consider completing our Web Accessibility Introductory Online Course, which should only take about twenty minutes.
Georgia Tech Branding and Theming Policy
Please see the Visual Design section of our Design Requirements for Developers guide for key highlights of the full institute Branding and Theming policy.
Please note that branding, which includes the gold Georgia Tech header and footer bars, is required on most websites by institute policy. Following theming standards for body content is not absolutely required, but highly recommended. When deviations are made, they should be done with respect to the spirit of campus branding standards, such as always adhering to the approved campus color palette and font choices.
Georgia Tech Editorial Style Guide
All web content should be written in conformance with the Georgia Tech Editorial Style Guide.
One area of particular note is that acronyms must be defined on their first use, and their use should be minimized in favor of other ways of referencing the entity. There are also some specific rules for referencing the institute and the college.
Please see our Guide to Acronym Usage for a full but straightforward explanation of the rules.
Institute Data Privacy and Security Policy
With the emergence of new, stricter privacy laws in the European Union that are enforceable against Georgia Tech (due to Georgia Tech having a European campus in France as well as many study-abroad programs in European Union countries), we must be extra careful with any collection of personal information from website users. Because of this, the use of web forms on websites is strongly discouraged. Instead, please use the institute approved Qualtrics service to create web forms, as it is properly configured to protect the collected data in accordance with institute policy and applicable law.
In addition, there are strict institute rules regarding the online collection of money for such activities as event registrations, selling of research products, etc.
Please see the separate Data and Money Collection page for full details on policy requirements that must be followed when collecting personal information and/or money via online forms and services.