Serve IT · Aug 2024 to Dec 2024 · Case study
Middle Way HouseWordPress redesign · pages staff can keep
Middle Way House supports survivors of domestic violence, sexual assault, and human trafficking. In those moments, people often need private, trustworthy, accessible information before it is safe to ask out loud. The website can be that quiet first door. Serve IT Fall 2024: I led a WordPress redesign so important paths were easier to find, and so staff could keep the site after students left. About 84 volunteer hours. The mission is not a design prop.
Typical realities around domestic violence are hard to talk about in public, so this page stays high-level on purpose. What I will say plainly: survivors and people supporting them need clear paths to help that do not demand a public conversation first. A clinic website has to be calm, findable, and usable on a phone ... including when someone only has a short window to look.
Serve IT framing for me: deliver pages people in hard moments can actually use, then leave them so staff can keep them without a student team on call. No invented stories. No clinical claims. Just the responsibility of a first door that has to work.
Who it is for: people who need Middle Way House, and staff who keep the site after students leave. What I did: led a WordPress redesign with Serve IT. Goal: important pages easier to find. Hours: about 84 volunteer hours.
This page is long because the rubric asks for every row. The semester detail is not filled in yet. Empty rows stay marked ... a blank is more honest than a story I don't have yet. Where the public-safe write-up needs a boundary, you will see an honest scope note. I would rather leave a blank than invent a metric or a quote.
01 · 5 pts
Introduction / professional profile
Who you are
Jade Zhao. Informatics student at IU Bloomington Luddy (May 2027). Student Digital Humans project lead. Laurie Burns McRobbie Serve IT Clinic, Jan 2024 to present. Clinic work for partners whose staff keep the page after students leave. On this term I led the Middle Way House WordPress redesign. About 84 volunteer hours.
Your area(s) of interest
Digital Humans, human-centred AI, UX (user experience), and business technology. This case study is the fall 2024 Middle Way House term.
Your technical strengths
WordPress clinic work with a clear handoff goal, and leaving a site staff can keep after students leave. The full list is on Serve IT.
The kinds of work you want to do
GTM (go-to-market) engineering, AI product, and solutions work. Digital Humans is the student project I keep studying. I only write down what has actually shipped.
Links
02 · 5 pts
Project overview
Problem statement
People use this site when they need Middle Way House ... sometimes as a quiet first step when asking out loud is not safe yet. If the important pages are hard to find, the site fails the person who came for help, and it fails the staff who have to keep it after we leave. I led a WordPress redesign with the clinic team. Goal: those pages easier to find on a real device, under real constraints. About 84 volunteer hours. Rows that aren't written yet are marked under Process, Deliverables, and Reflection.
- Dates
- Aug 2024 to Dec 2024. [still writing: exact kickoff and handoff dates from that semester]
- Team
- [still writing: team names from that semester's roster]
- What the team as a whole was asked to do
- [still writing: the semester brief, once it is safe to publish] True line for now: a WordPress redesign with Serve IT. Staff keep the site after students leave. Goal: important pages easier to find.
- What my part of the work entailed
- I led the WordPress redesign with the clinic team. Goal: important pages easier to find. About 84 volunteer hours.
03 · 5 pts
Client description
Client: Middle Way House. Agency website: https://middlewayhouse.org/. Per their public site, they empower survivors of domestic violence, sexual assault, and human trafficking through support, education, and prevention.
Why that matters for a student clinic build: the audience is not browsing for fun. Someone may be checking hours, services, or next steps in private, on a shared phone, or in a short gap of time. The site has to feel trustworthy and stay easy to update after the semester ends. People come here when they need Middle Way House. Staff still have to keep the site after we leave.
1. What the client wanted
[still writing: quote or paraphrase from the semester scope once it is safe to publish] True line for now: WordPress redesign with Serve IT, on a site staff can keep. Goal: important pages easier to find.
2. What problem you tried to solve
[still writing: client-stated problem in their words] True line for now: if the important pages are hard to find, the person who needs Middle Way House, and the staff who keep the site, both get stuck.
3. The process you went through to reach the final solution
[still writing: short process summary once the redesign notes are written up] See also the labelled rows under Process / how you worked.
4. What that final solution is
[still writing: which pages moved, and what staff were left to maintain] True line for now: a WordPress redesign I led with Serve IT. About 84 volunteer hours. Goal: important pages easier to find.
04 · 5 pts
Process / how you worked
True boundary for every row below: I led a WordPress redesign with Serve IT. About 84 volunteer hours. Staff still have to keep the site after we leave. The semester detail is not filled in yet.
Research
[still writing: stakeholder research notes / public-safe summary]
Data collection
[still writing: which pages people needed, and how you learned that]
Accessibility assessment
[still writing: accessibility checks if you did them on this project]
Wireframes
[still writing: wireframes if you made any for the WordPress pages]
Agile / sprint workflows
[still writing: how the team organised the weeks]
Testing
[still writing: how you checked that important pages were easier to find]
Iteration
[still writing: what you changed in the redesign before handoff]
Technical decision-making
[still writing: WordPress choices you can name in public, and what you left for staff to edit] Boundary that stays firm: staff have to keep the site after students leave.
05 · 5 pts
Tools and technologies
Only real lines where confirmed. Unconfirmed tools stay marked.
- Figma
- [still writing: name the tool if you used it]
- Tableau
- [still writing: name the tool if you used it]
- GitHub
- Real for this portfolio: github.com/jadexzhao versions the public case study page.
- Excel
- [still writing: name the tool if you used it]
- Accessibility tools
- [still writing: name the tool if you used it]
- CMS platforms
- WordPress. I led a redesign with the clinic team. Goal: important pages easier to find. Staff still have to keep the site after we leave.
- APIs
- [still writing: name the tool if you used it]
- Microsoft Planner / Teams
- [still writing: name the tool if you used it]
06 · 10 pts
Deliverables / artifacts
Security-team documents must keep client privacy. Block out or remove client names and website mentions on any item shown. On this public page, do not paste private scope text, vulnerabilities, or non-public names. Middle Way House is the public project name and is fine.
Screenshots
[still writing: public-safe screenshot]
Dashboard images
[still writing: dashboard image if used]
Wireframes
[still writing: wireframe or annotation if used]
Reports
[still writing: redesign notes staff can still read]
Code snippets
[still writing: code snippet if relevant]
Data visualisations
[still writing: data visualisation if used]
Videos / demo links
[still writing: video or demo link if used]
Presentation slides
[still writing: presentation slides]
Before / after comparisons
[still writing: before / after of the WordPress pages, if a public-safe pair exists]
Testimonials or client feedback
[still writing: attributed quote with permission, in quotation marks]
07 · 10 pts
Final reflection
The semester detail is not filled in on this page yet. Empty rows stay marked until the notes are real.
What you learned
[still writing: what I learned]
Challenges encountered
[still writing: challenges encountered]
What you would improve
[still writing: what I would improve]
Team communication lessons
[still writing: team communication lessons]
Ethical considerations
Domestic violence realities are hard to talk about in public, so this write-up stays high-level on purpose. Survivors and people supporting them may use a website as a quiet first door when asking out loud is not safe yet. That means my job was not to dramatise the mission for a portfolio. It was to make paths private, trustworthy, and findable ... and to leave staff a site they can keep without a student team on call. No invented client stories. No clinical framing. Public-safe detail only.
Technical growth
[still writing: technical growth]