Case Study – Shorelight

Shorelight is a Boston-based institution that empowers international students by connecting them with undergraduate and graduate programs at universities across the United States. With their aim to improve the accessibility of US programs to foreign students, Shorelight’s lack of a course catalog was counteractive to this goal. To address this, Shorelight partnered with Clean Catalog to build a highly customized solution that serves both internal staff and international students. The Clean Catalog team helped Shorelight create an efficient, user-friendly system tailored to its unique needs, enhancing the experience for students and staff alike.

The Challenges

As an organization dedicated to supporting international students, Shorelight relies heavily on digital platforms to communicate with foreign students. However, despite their innovative approach to education, Shorelight faced a critical gap: they lacked a digital course catalog. Without a catalog, prospective students struggled to access crucial course information, creating inefficiencies and barriers to communication. Similarly, staff members did not have a centralized location to view available coursework for students. This posed logistical challenges for both internal teams and international students navigating an unfamiliar educational landscape.

The Process

Recognizing the need for a streamlined solution, Shorelight partnered with Clean Catalog to develop its first-ever course catalog. The goal was to create a dual-function catalog that served the needs of both internal staff and students while flexing to the institution's operational complexities. From the start, the build-out revolved around customization and user-friendliness. As Jennifer Paz, Manager of Instructional Design at Shorelight, noted, "we have a highly customized instance of Clean Catalog because we are not a traditional 'school' client. Despite the complicated nature of our catalog, Clean Catalog was able to handle the customization without any pushback or issues."

After a few onboarding calls to understand their institution’s goals and structure, the Clean Catalog team drafted a custom format for the Shorelight catalog, gathering feedback from the Shorelight staff every step of the way. Once the format and functionality were perfected, we turned our focus to the appearance of the catalog. Our team integrated Shorelight’s brand standards and a custom footer, which helps their catalog appear as a seamless extension of their primary website.

Our Solutions

Rather than organizing the catalog with course, degree, and program tabs in the navigation, we used “student” and “university” as the two primary user pathways. These options are presented in a custom sidebar navigation menu, allowing users to easily toggle to the student-view or the staf–view of the catalog. The staff-side of the catalog is designed for operational efficiency. This version equips Shorelight's staff with the background information needed to recommend certain coursework to prospective international students. The course listings have an additional field for “learning model,” which is not visible on the student-version of the catalog. The student version was created with accessibility in mind. It ensures international students can easily browse and understand the programs available to them, reducing barriers to enrollment and course selection.They can also filter course listings by program, format, and modality, allowing them to quickly locate courses relevant to their needs.

Jennifer highlighted the importance of this dual approach, saying, "Their team was very supportive and knowledgeable and worked with us diligently to meet our every need." Clean Catalog’s intuitive admin interface made adoption straightforward. Jennifer explained, "It’s fairly easy to use. It will help us a lot." Additionally, comprehensive staff training and ongoing customer support have played a pivotal role in a successful catalog launch.

Looking Forward

With Clean Catalog in place, Shorelight is poised to enhance the experience for international students and staff alike. The catalog serves as a critical tool not only for streamlining communication, but is a new marketing publication showcasing Shorelight’s programs to a global audience. Reflecting on their catalog journey, Jennifer remarked, "I would absolutely recommend Clean Catalog. Their customer training and support have been phenomenal, and the product itself is outstanding."

As Shorelight continues its mission to bridge international students with higher education opportunities in the U.S., their new course catalog will support them in achieving institutional goals. If you’d like to learn more about Clean Catalog’s customizability or unique use cases, please do not hesitate to reach out to us or schedule a demo.