Title
  1. Our Work
  2. Government

Creating a new state agency site

Project Summary
Department of Children, Youth and Families
Featured Image
different generations of people together outdoors
Project Overview

The Department of Children, Youth and Families (DCYF) is the newest department within the State of Minnesota.

 Its primary audiences are families and those who work with them — child care providers, early childhood education groups, nonprofits, and other organizations serving children and families across Minnesota — with a focus on coordination, engagement, and culturally and individually responsive programs that meet children's developmental needs.

Electric Citizen led the design and build of the department's first public website.

Services Provided
Service Areas
Information Architecture
Service Area (Industry)
Government Website Design and Development
Sections
screenshots of DCYF homepage
Challenges

DCYF is a consolidation of approximately 175 programs and services previously spread across four state departments — Education, Health, Human Services, and Public Safety — brought together under one new organization. 

The first challenge was coordination: bringing together programs, content, editors, and audiences that had never shared an organization. 

The second was design and branding, for a department starting from scratch with no existing website or brand materials. 

The third was timing, with a transitional public launch set for July 1, 2024, the site had to be planned, designed, built, and launched in under six months.

screenshots of DCYF web pages
Solutions

Our team worked with the department to identify target audiences and organize site content and navigation around the needs of core users — in service of the State's stated vision of a “clear front door for families.” 

The design centered on a human-centered approach that put children and families first. To meet the compressed timeline, we worked with the department on a defined work plan, a condensed revision cycle, and a clear scope for what would launch and what would follow in a post-launch phase two.

Advisory boards webpage
Advisory boards webpage
Department homepage
Department homepage
Programs webpage
Programs webpage
Sample of dropdown menu
Sample of dropdown menu
Results

The site launched on time and within budget, in under six months, and served almost 500k users in its first 9 months. It provides a single online resource for families who previously had to navigate four separate state departments for information. Electric Citizen continues to support DCYF with additional site features and improvements following launch.

This work was performed for the Minnesota Department of Children, Youth and Families under the State of Minnesota's MNSITE contract program. It is a factual description of a completed project and does not imply the State's endorsement of Electric Citizen or its services.