Redish chose a very good example of a website in need of change. The largest problem the website has is that it is trying way too hard to do way to many things. All that it needs to do is be a spring board to websites for the other departments. It is attempting to also be a news source and many other things that it does not need to be!
The usability tests that Redish conducted resulted in some very good results. For one, I personally would have also tried to type into the "Select a topic" box. The agency description information they found out was also very important because the HHS had their selecting process backwards, you should have been able to search through agencies to get to topics, not topics to agencies.
The relaunch of the HHS website provides a much more conducive experience for the user. One of the most important things Redish pointed out that she learned is " If you don't have a search box in an obvious place, users will assume that any open field is the search box." The website I chose has many of the same pitfalls that HHS had.
The City of Minneapolis website is close to just as bad. It is also trying to do many more things than necessary. It is a news site, a job forum, an events page, there are two select a topic bars and between them have nearly 50 topics!!! Usability is a serious issue with the city of Minneapolis site.
Great example to share in the City of Minneapolis website. There is a lot going on in this site, and you'd have plenty to analyze if you worked on this for the class project. Are you interested in this site for the class project?
Yes, I do think that I will be using this site. I think that there is a lot I could do with it to make it much more effective.