Students help businesswoman get online

20/01/2010

Winning web design student Geoff Millar

When a local businesswoman needed an interactive website, she asked budding designers at Central Sussex College to rise to the challenge.

Sussex-based Psychotherapeutic Counsellor Katherine King approached Ramiz Alihodzic, Lecturer in Computing and IT, with the idea of commissioning students to design and build her a website, a project which formed part of their coursework for their Level 3 BTEC National Award in IT. During the autumn term 24 students set about designing the winning site which would go live at the end of the project.

Katherine, who has two practices in the area, provided students with a written brief and their ideas went from the drawing board to fully functioning websites, combining a corporate look with the students' own innovative ideas. Katherine said: "I was very impressed with both the creativity and professionalism of their designs, but also the students' willingness to take on board my feedback to build a site that fulfilled all my commercial needs."

Katherine had a difficult task choosing her new website but eventually chose the site created by 26-year-old Geoff Millar, commenting on its "professional look, ease of navigation for clients and communication of my counselling philosophy." Kristian Thomson and Lauren Hubbard's sites were chosen as runners up.

Having been made redundant from his job in recruitment, Geoff enrolled on the BTEC course in September to retrain for a new career in IT. He was thrilled that his design was chosen, saying: "I am very pleased to have won the competition, and feel I have learnt and achieved a great deal in a short amount of time. I have found the course both interesting and challenging, and look forward to developing my skills further in the future." After completing his BTEC course this summer, Geoff will enrol on a degree course at the University of Sussex.

Following the site's launch in December, Katherine said: "It has been a very positive personal experience. This project has produced a website which I believe will help promote my work in West Sussex and which also demonstrates the College's commitment to their students achieving commercial success."