Web Writing: Style and Appearance

Writing Styles and Standards

TMCC's website and online communications adhere to a modified Associated Press (AP) Stylebook. For more details and examples of common style occurrences, it is highly recommended to visit the College Style Guide that's posted under TMCC's Marketing and Communications Office. 

View Style Guide

Additional Style Information for Online Content

Consistent look, feel and function improves usability and presents TMCC as a unified organization.

  • You may use italics to indicate book titles and magazine titles.
  • Do not use underlines; Web users may think that they are links.
  • Use bold only sparingly to emphasize points or bring attention to key phrases.
  • Do not colorize text. You don’t need to make things red and flashy to grab attention. A clean page and layout does that for you automatically.
  • Do not manually adjust font size.
  • Do not use UPPERCASE for anything (except abbreviations or acronyms).
  • Use header styles (H3s and H4s) for headings as provided in the CMS editor. Do not create your own headings in the HTML.
  • Don’t try to override or change the page style that is already present. Focus on content.

WRONG

The TMCC Business Plan Competition seeks to teach students at ALL high school, college and university levels the IMPORTANCE of developing high quality business ideas and plans. The competition also seeks to provide them with the resources, not only to write comprehensive, complete and concise business strategies, but to also see those plans come to be realized. Participants of TMCC Business Plan Competition are strongly encouraged to participate in the spring Donald W. Reynold's Governor's Cup Business Plan Competition and the subsequent Tri-State Competition to compete for a share of the more than $250,000 in CASH prizes offered.

RIGHT

The TMCC Business Plan Competition seeks to teach students at all high school, college and university levels the importance of developing high quality business ideas and plans.

The competition also seeks to provide them with the resources, not only to write comprehensive, complete and concise business strategies, but to also see those plans come to be realized.

To compete for a share of the more than $250,000 in cash prizes, we strongly encourage participation in the Governor's Cup Business Plan Competition and the Tri-State Competition

Accuracy and Timeless Content

Make sure that all information presented is correct. Incorrect or outdated information is unacceptable and should be updated immediately. Try to avoid posting absolute dates and years in your content if you can. Making your content timeless (or evergreen) will lessen how often it might become outdated.

WRONG

The Handbook of Guidelines for students for 2007 (including information from TMCC President Philip Ringle) is a required resource for all students.

COMING SOON: The Updated Handbook of Guidelines. We are working on it and should have it ready in the very near future!!!

RIGHT

The TMCC Handbook of Guidelines for Students is a required resource for all students and includes important information from the TMCC President. An updated/revised version will be available on November 5, 2022.

Spelling, Grammar and Abbreviations

All Web pages must be free of spelling errors. Carefully proofread material and review the CMS spell-checker results that appear after you submit a page. Text on the TMCC website should follow the grammar, punctuation and spelling rules outlined in the Associated Press Stylebook.

Use of abbreviations should follow the TMCC style guide and the AP Stylebook.