Inside UChicago: A Fresh New Look and Name for the UChicago Intranet

The University of Chicago is unveiling a new design for its intranet, now renamed Inside UChicago. The updated intranet.uchicago.edu features the University's iconic maroon color and is designed to enhance digital accessibility. “Inside UChicago is an important resource for sharing essential information with our campus community,” said Paul M. Rand, vice president of communications at the University of Chicago. “The new intranet design is more accessible and the expanded content provides even more incentive to come back regularly.”

As an intranet portal, Inside UChicago is the primary hub for helping staff and academics access all the latest University news, announcements, events, and resources across the University—and log into various workplace applications such as Oracle, Workday, and GEMS—all from one place. Usage of the site has grown and traffic to the platform grew to 1.7 million pageviews last year, a 247% increase from the previous year.

Most of the information on the website today is set up for staff and academics who log in with their CNET password. As more and more units across the University choose to migrate their websites to Inside UChicago, each unit can decide if they want all or part of their information to be password-protected or available to a wider audience.

IT Services and Human Resources are two departments that plan to fully migrate their existing websites onto Inside UChicago in 2025. Both units have information on their website and functionality that requires gated and ungated access. For example, the details of the University’s benefits packages are important for recruiting prospective employees and need to be publicly available, but the ability to sign-up for the University’s benefits during the annual open enrollment process, which is only available for current, benefits-eligible employees, needs to be password protected. New templates are now available to simplify the process of onboarding new sub-sites like IT Services and Human Resources.

“By lowering barriers for units to migrate their information onto Inside UChicago, we can begin to integrate the numerous standalone websites across the University that are disconnected,” said Micheline Pergande, director of internal communications at UChicago. “This will make it easier for members of our UChicago community to find the essential resources and campus services they need.”

The site’s primary navigation menu was coded according to best practices, which helps visitors who use keyboards, screen readers, and other assistive technologies to navigate the site more easily.

“Accessibility was a priority throughout the project,” said Thalia Kapica, senior web accessibility specialist at the University of Chicago’s Center for Digital Accessibility. "Through collaboration with University Communications and the Enterprise Application teams, the revamped navigation for Inside UChicago offers all users, including people with disabilities, a more usable and accessible experience."

Staff and academics who log into Inside UChicago using the sign-in button at the top will still be able to access their personalized settings:

• News Subscriptions: Choose the news you want to see in your News feeds on the Intranet by selecting your department, division, school or office and any topics that interest you in My News Subscriptions.

• Favorite Pages: Keep a list of your favorite pages by clicking on the "star" icon on any page and view them in My Favorite Pages.

• Bookmarks: Bookmark any news article or announcement by clicking on the "bookmark" icon and view them in My Bookmarks.

• Toolbox: Choose up to six UChicago secure systems and applications (i.e., Workday, Box, GEMS, Oracle, etc.) that you use frequently in My Toolbox, which appears on your homepage.

Expanding access to the intranet beyond staff and academics is also a goal for this year. University Communications is currently working with UChicago GRAD and IT Services to set up access to the intranet for postdocs. In the short term, Inside UChicago now features a new “Info For” menu in the header and landing pages highlighting key resources for different members of our campus community, including a new page for postdocs.

For more information, visit Inside UChicago at intranet.uchicago.edu.