DanielleThierryUSDSVA
commented
4 years ago Notes from reviews
(will cross post in individual issues as well)
2020 VA education rates
- I'm confused because there appear to be 2 Drupal nodes where work was done on this page. There's this one (prod.cms.va.gov/939/), which is the existing page and it does now have some updates to 2020 (but still had 2019 in some places) and still has the old H1. But then there's this one (prod.cms.va.gov/2019-va-education-benefit-rates), which also has some updates to 2020 (but still has 2019 in some places...and has 2019 added to url). I've edited both for now, but confused as to what we're doing on these pages. Did we intent to clone the page to make a historical 2019 rates page maybe? If yes, I'm not sure that's needed for the intro page...I think we'd just have historic pages for the individual rate pages if anything (and only if needed...this should be a question we talk about specific to education rates). Or did the work somehow just get confused or dropped off before updating everything in the right places?
- Added the primary and secondary keywords from the GitHub page to the Drupal meta data. We'd agreed to do this back when we started the Drupal migration so that when someone goes into the Drupal page, they can easily see which keywords we're targeting on that page for optimization and don't have to track back to my old SEO spreadsheet. I believe we're still doing this, correct?
- Updated the year in the H1, intro text, and meta description. It still had 2019, and looks like date was only updated in title tag but missed in the other places.
- We need to fix this URL to remove 2019, as noted above (I haven't done so yet because I don't want to risk messing something up since there appears to be work done on this page in 2 different Drupal nodes).
- We need to fix the URL for Post-9/11 GI Bill (Chapter 33) rates. It looks like it's /2020-post-911-gi-bill-chapter-33-rates. The main rates page for the current year should be year-agnostic so that it can remain an evergreen year. I'll fix this on the actual page and then fix here to match.
- Fixed link summary for $600 Buy-Up program. It still had a reference to increasing REAP payment in there, but REAP is no longer available.
- Moved GI Bill Comparison tool up into the main section as the first link. Since this tool specifically lets the user look at and compare rates, it feels like it really should be up there in the main section rather than buried in related links. Going to check in with Mikki on this one for a gut check.
2020 Montgomery GI Bill Selected Reserve rates
- Added the primary and secondary keywords to the meta data.
- Globally changing "2020 academic year" to "2020 to 2021 academic year" in intro text and meta descriptions for more precise accuracy, as we'd discussed briefly (I think in a call). Fine to leave just "2020" in H1s due to character count limits.
- Fixed url. It was set to "Generate automatic URL alias" and was showing as "/2020-montgomery-gi-bill-selected-reserve-rates". We need the current rates page to remain year agnostic so it can be an evergreen url.
- Added the following into the intro to give the user, and especially screen readers, more context for the page structure: "Your monthly rates (or payment amounts) will depend on the type of education or training you're taking and your enrollment status or time spent in training."
- Fixed first H2, as it was well over our new 70-character limit for H2s and H3s. Changed it to "MGIB-SR rates for institutions of higher learning" and then added the additional details as this body copy sentence beneath: "The rates in the table below apply for courses at colleges, universities, trade schools, and other institutions of higher learning."
- Added a similar sentence ("The rates in the table below apply for apprenticeships and on-the-job training") to the second section for consistency with approach to first section.
- Added an in-text crosslink to the on-the-job training page for more information.
- Added a similar sentence ("The rates listed below apply for correspondence, flight, and cooperative (co-op) training programs") to the third section for consistency with approach to first section.
- Tracked how we're referring to these programs in the "How to use your benefits" section and updated language on this rates page to match for consistency across the site. So "cooperative training programs" becomes "co-op training," "flight schools" becomes "flight training," and "correspondence schools" becomes "correspondence training". We want to be consistent with terms across all pages as much as possible.
- Added in a bit more contextual information for "correspondence training" and "co-op training" descriptions, and added in-text crosslinks to flight training and co-op training pages which have more info on eligibility for those benefits. Didn't crosslink to correspondence training because that page doesn't really have much more than is here.
- Changed approach to tables to place the contextual information, including a description of the table and the "All rates in $ U.S. dollars" in the "table caption" field to make it more clear for screen readers. Note: Would like to consult with Jen Strickland on this to make sure of approach before implementing across other pages, and potential issues with table captions being the same size as the H3s. Will do that next week. 6/3/20 update: Confirmed table caption approach with Jen Strickland.
- Fixed one phone number that wasn't linked.
- Added in historic rates section with links. This appeared to be missing from the page entirely.
2020 Montgomery GI Bill Active Duty rates
- Removed "also called" in intro and meta description, as it's not needed for an acronym. Can just say, "Montgomery GI Bill Active Duty (MGIB-AD)."
- Added this sentence in intro to make it clear, particularly for screen readers, the differentiation of rates that's going to be on the page: "Your monthly payment amounts will depend on how long you've served on active duty and the type of education or training you're taking."
- Fixed H3 that was well over our new 70-character limit, and added the information contextually in the body text so that it's now: For institutions of higher learning for H3 and then "The rates in the table below apply for courses at colleges, trade schools, and other institutions of higher learning, if you served at least 3 years on active duty." in body text. Adding the timing for the deeper subsections since some are pretty far from the H2s...want to make sure that someone scrolling or using a screen reader doesn't lose the greater context of timing on further down subsections.
- Added similar contextual information for all sections.
- Changed approach to tables to place the contextual information, including a description of the table and the "All rates in $ U.S. dollars" in the "table caption" field to make it more clear for screen readers. Note: Would like to consult with Jen Strickland on this to make sure of approach before implementing across other pages, and potential issues with table captions being the same size as the H3s. Will do that next week.
- Changed historical rate link labels to better match the H1s of the pages they'll go to (ie, "Rates effective October 1, 2018" becomes "2019 rates (effective October 1, 2018")
Post-9/11 GI Bill (Chapter 33) rates
- The name of this benefit is Post-9/11, but we then talk about the timing requirement as "After September 10, 2001," rather than how we've said it other places (like on the eligibility page: https://www.va.gov/education/about-gi-bill-benefits/post-9-11/) ("On or after September 11, 2001"). I don't recall if this was an intentional decision to simplify to just "after" rather than "on or after," but I think it's a little confusing to have the benefit name refer to 9/11 and then the requirement refer to 9/10. And we should definitely be consistent across the site. So I've changed here to read, "On or after September 11, 2001." Follow-up note: We should do a sweep of this phrasing across the site to make sure we're consistent everywhere. I can create an issue for this. We may also want to consider explicitly stating this in content style guide, if we don't already.
- Fixed date in first table (still said "2019" and should be "2020")
- Added table captions for screen reader benefit. Note: Confirmed with Jen Strickland that captions are the correct approach.
- Action item for team: On this page, we include specific academic year dates as an "effective date." We should be consistent across all of these rate pages. Let's go back into all of these pages and add effective dates.
- Added "(with or without a break in service" to first bullet in eligibility info to differentiate from the continuous service bullet
- Made historic rate link labels more clear
- Fixed URL to remove "2020"
- Added keywords to meta data.
- Made intro shorter, changed "view" to "review" and added "read below to" for clarity. Removed "*August 1, 2020, to July 31, 2021)** to keep intro as brief as possible.
psanders86
RLHecht
Content review task, to review PW Content work that has been created and/or updated
Goal: Complete a review of the listed items. As needed, document recommendations so that we can create follow-up tasks.
Output:
List of items to review: Education Rewrites Restart bundle