Publishing Separate Undergraduate and Graduate Catalogs

There are many reasons an institution may want to host multiple course catalogs within the same site. Whether your school has multiple campuses, a separate catalog for the honors college, or offers both graduate and undergraduate degrees, we have a catalog solution for you. The most common of these scenarios is for a school to publish an undergraduate catalog and graduate catalog in tandem, with varying levels of interaction between the two publications. Based on the needs of your institution, we can design a multi-catalog system that serves both your staff and students alike.

Hosting Options

Multiple catalogs can be hosted in a variety of ways, with the most popular option being to manage both catalogs from the same site. This allows catalog admin to edit both the undergraduate and graduate catalogs from the same interface without needing to login to two separate sites. This also simplifies the technical configurations of the site, including editorial workflows, user permissions, and user roles. When new catalog content is created, users can easily dictate which catalog it should live within.

A secondary option is for the undergraduate and graduate catalogs to operate fully independently from one another. This is typically the best configuration if you do not have any overlap between catalog admin, and there are no instances in which an admin would need to edit both catalogs. This setup may also be appropriate if the overarching structure, formatting, and design of the two catalogs need to differ drastically.

Finally, we always offer a custom configuration based on the specific needs of your institution. Perhaps your staff manages catalog content in a unique way, or wants a combination of the different configurations outlined above. Based on the functionality you need, our team will tailor-make a custom site configuration to meet those requirements.

Customizing Layouts and Interfaces

Equally as important as the backend configuration of your catalogs is the frontend experience for users. Your institution will need to decide how integrated the two catalogs should be, or whether they should operate as entirely separate entities. Many schools we’ve worked with, such as Georgetown College and Northwest Nazarene University, have chosen to display both catalogs on a homepage or navigation bar. This allows students to toggle between the two seamlessly and have visibility into each catalog’s course offerings. We can also configure each catalog to have a unique URL for the frontend of the site, allowing each catalog to operate entirely independently of one another. Villanova University opted for this approach with their Undergraduate Catalog and Graduate Catalog. No matter which approach you prefer, the design and user interface can be completely customized based on your institution’s vision for these publications.

Advantages of Co-Hosting Catalogs

By hosting both catalogs within the same site and software platform, you simplify the management process for your staff. Our SSO capabilities and granular permission settings give your admin greater access to the content they need, and make it easy to publish new content to a specific catalog. Hosting both catalogs within the same site also lessens the learning curve for your staff to grow familiar with navigating the backend of the site. The backend of our catalog sites are intuitive to use, even for the least tech-savvy staff member. The best part of all? Clean Catalog takes care of the initial build-out and content migration for you, so moving to a multi-catalog system requires minimal lift for your staff.

Interested in learning more about co-hosting your graduate and undergraduate catalogs? Feel free to reach out to us – we’d love to schedule a demo and answer any questions you may have.