A Website Rebuilt Around A School’s Five-Year Strategic Plan
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Digital Silk first redesigned Miami Country Day School’s website back in 2022. Since then the school has changed: in January 2026 its Board of Trustees adopted The Country Day Way Forward, a five-year strategic plan, alongside a new flexible schedule and plans to grow its Online School.
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This second iteration went further than a redesign. We developed a digital strategy and brand messaging around the new plan, restructured how the site is organized for every audience, and rebuilt the platform on WordPress.
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The new site runs to roughly 100 pages, with dedicated pathways for each school division and the Online School, faculty profiles pulled automatically from Blackbaud, and custom interactive maps of the campus and the school’s international programs.
The Challenge
A Website That No Longer Reflected The School’s Direction
The Country Day Way Forward sets out three pillars: The Country Day Way, Exceptional Educators and a Thriving Community. The existing site was built before the plan existed, so it had no way to tell that story or show how the pillars shape daily life at the school.
A New Schedule Families Needed To Understand
The flexible schedule was designed around student well-being, but a change to the school day raises real questions for families. The site needed to explain clearly how it works and why it matters.
Growing Beyond South Florida
The Online School opens MCDS to students well outside Miami. Reaching those families meant expanding the school’s reach in search while protecting the strong local visibility it had already built.
A Structure The School Had Outgrown
As MCDS added programs, the site’s sitemap and content structure became harder to navigate. Information that prospective families, current parents, students, faculty and alumni each needed was getting harder to find.
Many Audiences, One Website
Prospective families want to explore and apply. Current parents need news, events and daily resources. Faculty, alumni and students each come with their own needs. The site had to serve all of them without any group getting lost in content meant for another.
The Solution
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Strategy Rooted In The New Plan
We met with school leadership and department heads to understand how The Country Day Way Forward shapes teaching and community life, then tested those insights against research into Miami-area private schools, schools with flexible schedules and online programs. That work produced personas for Lower School, Middle and Upper School, and Online School families, plus positioning and messaging built around educating the whole child. -
An Architecture Built Around Each Audience
We rebuilt the sitemap and navigation around how each audience searches. Early Childhood, Lower, Middle and Upper School and the Online School each have dedicated pages. A new Our Strategic Plan page presents the three pillars, and signature programs including the Garner Center for Innovation, GLOBE, CASW, Athletics and the Arts each have a clear home. -
Clearer Paths To Enrollment
We streamlined the enrollment journey across inquiry, how to apply, tuition, tuition assistance and campus tours, so a prospective family can move from interest to application without hunting for the next step. Summer camp has its own section with program, add-on and registration paths. -
Moving From Blackbaud To WordPress
The previous site ran on Blackbaud. We rebuilt the platform on WordPress to give the MCDS marketing team more flexibility and direct control over news, events and program pages, while keeping Blackbaud connected where it matters. A custom API integration pulls faculty and staff data into the site automatically to power the Exceptional Educators pages, and families keep access to their existing Blackbaud resources. -
Custom Interactive Features
We developed an interactive virtual tour map of the campus and a GATEway destinations map showcasing the school’s international program experiences, giving families a way to explore both the campus and the world beyond it. -
Design And Copy That Tell The Story
Every custom page was prototyped and approved in Figma before development. New copy brings the strategic plan and the Country Day Way to life for parents and students alike, pairing the school’s own brand language with keyword-focused headings. -
Search, Accessibility And Compliance
We migrated and restructured legacy content into the new architecture, mapped redirects from old URLs to protect search equity, and carried out keyword research with page-level keyword mapping, metadata and heading updates. Accessibility improvements run across templates and content, alongside cookie consent, privacy compliance and technical QA before and after launch.
The Results
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A Strategic Plan Brought Onlinewith a dedicated home for The Country Day Way Forward and its three pillars
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Dedicated Pathwaysfor Early Childhood, Lower, Middle and Upper School, plus an Online School built to reach beyond South Florida
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Two Custom Interactive Mapsoffering a virtual campus tour and a GATEway map of international program experiences
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A WordPress Platform The School Controlsgiving the marketing team direct control of news, events and programs across roughly 100 pages
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