What is PAWS?

PAWS (or the Platform for Academic Websites) will be a scalable, cost-effective content management system specifically designed for UCSF academic units. It’s especially tailored to schools and large departments which manage multiple interrelated sites.

The primary objectives of PAWS are to simplify website management, enhance the user experience, and ensure compliance with UCSF standards.  

Why PAWS?

UCSF has over 30 academic units of this scale, many with websites over 5 years old or running on software approaching end-of-life. The current approach of “fend for yourself” often leads to high costs, time-consuming builds, and unpredictable maintenance demands.

As a result, the status quo often leads to a fragmented user experience and disjointed brand identity for both editors and visitors. In some cases, site visitors are unable to find the information they need or what they do find is out of date or incomplete.

Goals and Outcomes

Organizational Impact

By building PAWS, we aim to transform UCSF's academic websites by consolidating them onto a unified platform.  This will streamline maintenance, enhance user experience, and provide future flexibility. The key goals include:  

• Reducing maintenance costs by 50%  
• Decreasing site creation and migration time
• Ensuring consistent branding and functionality across all sites.

Key Focus Areas

The unified Drupal platform provides the foundation to improve critical functions for all platform adopters at once.

• Integrations: Leverages existing UCSF applications like MyAccess, profiles, and calendar, while also serving as a content component for the Echo internal communications ecosystem.
• Streamlined Maintenance: Shared codebase allows for centralized hosting and coordinated security and system updates, reducing long-term costs and improving efficiency.
• Enhanced User Experience: Provides a consistent experience for users and editors, improving engagement.
• Content Operations: Features empowering communicators to manage sites more effectively like drafts and moderation, audit views, and review tracking.
• Flexibility: Offers customization to meet diverse content needs while maintaining consistency.

Meet the PAWS Team

The PAWS project is a collaborative effort driven by dedicated teams across UCSF. IT Web Services is responsible for development and delivery, and Education IT is contributing leadership, guidance, and the stakeholder coordination which will define the product and shape priorities.  

A Customer Advisory Board has been convened to provide direct input and oversight in coordination with the formal IT Governance committees for communications (CCT) and education (CET).  

In addition to the CAB, ongoing user and stakeholder interviews will ensure that input and feedback shape the platform's development, enabling us to tailor solutions that can address the unique requirements and challenges of each academic department.

Where We Are/Next Steps

Currently, we are in the discovery phase, conducting user interviews and scoping the project. Design, development, and QA phases will follow—accelerated by utilizing work previously started in the School of Pharmacy and incorporating lessons learned and components from other recent projects.

Pilot migrations are planned to take place from November to December, followed by further migrations and the platform transition to its ongoing product phase, where customer governance will oversee maintenance and enhancement. UCSF IT is committed to the long-term success and sustainability of PAWS, and will work with the CAB to plan and deliver the necessary ongoing support.

We Want to Hear From You!

Have questions or feedback? We're here to listen! Reach out to us to share your thoughts or learn more:

Eric Davila
PAWS Product Owner
[email protected]

Dana Adams
PAWS Product Manager
[email protected]

Noelle Hylton
Director of Education Systems and Applications
[email protected]