University of Pennsylvania

Educating the Whole Person

The Situation

SNF Paideia is a community of students, faculty, and staff committed to the integration of personal and social wellness, and serves as the central hub for civic engagement in undergraduate education at the University of Pennsylvania. Designed to encourage the development of citizen-leaders and to rekindle civil discourse, the program aims to engage the whole student body and communities beyond campus. Armed with a purpose and generously supported by the Stavros Niarchos Foundation (SNF), the Paideia program was eager to reach the student body with new programming and courses for the Spring 2020 semester.

Our Approach

Once engaged, Untuck was eager to formulate a brand platform, design a comprehensive identity, and develop a digital presence to launch the new program's offerings. We collaborated with the SNF Paideia faculty and staff to define the program and its core attributes, establish a brand voice, determine differentiators, and identify audience segments. This led us to develop the visual identity for the program which supports the overall strategy, communicates the concept, and inspires a response. Then specific goals and parameters were set for the user interface and development of the website.

Services

Competitive Research
Brand Positioning
Brand Architecture
Voice & Messaging
Visual Identity
Brand Guidelines
Iconography
Web Design
Web Development
Content Management

A well-rounded, holistic experience.

The SNF Paideia program is rooted in the concepts of dialogue, wellness, citizenship, and service which prompted us to create four complementary icons that overlap to become the main SNF Paideia symbol. These icons were inspired by Penn's 12 schools—represented as spokes on a wheel—further supporting a 360-degree transformation to educate the whole person. A secondary set of icons was also executed to represent the program's focus areas. These can be used to indicate an association with a class, fellowship, or event across various applications.

Curated elements for a dynamic system.

SNF Paideia graphic elements are used as a central point for creating dynamic layouts in all printed and online communications. Concentric circles are used as a detail behind images or as a background texture to further the holistic approach of the program. Large cropped circles can be used as containers for text on top of color images or as color blocks to separate out content in various layouts.

A digital space for constructive dialogue.

To promote ongoing SNF Paideia course offerings, foster student recruitment, and engage the Penn community-at-large, we imagined a compelling website that targets key audiences with content and clear opportunities to interact. We began by designing a comprehensive template system maintaining visual consistency with the brand identity. Then intuitive content management capabilities were enabled for internal teams, built using a fully responsive methodology, ensuring that it works seamlessly across devices and screen sizes, in-line with modern technologies.

Content is served up dynamically based on tags so that every piece of content is connected to additional stories, blog posts, and videos. This allows users to engage with content on the site in an active way by reading blog posts, registering for events, applying for fellowships, and listening to podcasts or watching videos. The site functions as a virtual hub for events to promote dialogue.