Suffolk University in Boston, Massachusetts, has been awarded the CampusTours October 2008 Four Star Tour Award for their creative virtual tour and interactive map.

Suffolk University's new video campus tour is arranged to emulate an appointment book, with individual enties consisting of student, faculty and employer interview videos. The Suffolk virtual tour is designed specifically for undergraduates, and provides a disarming and entertaining way to begin to explore the institution. As visitors watch the videos, InteractiveVideo points rise up and expand to indicate more information is available on the current topic of discussion. Clicking any of these interactive video points yields a "notebook" with photos, descriptions, building links, external website links and more videos. By connecting generalized introductory presentations to more granular campus information Suffolk is able to provide a more malleable experience to students with a wide range of interests.

Each video tour in the Suffolk tour features students, faculty members and even an employer talking about particular aspects of the programs, campus and student experience. CampusTours surveys indicate that students value these perspectives from their peers, and providing a spectrum of different student experiences allows visitors to see past points that do not directly address their interests. Finally, by keeping the videos under two minutes in running time, Suffolk maintains interest and encourages further exploration.

Suffolk also provides a fun and informative interactive campus map as part of the tour experience (click the Campus Map button in the upper right of the interface). The Suffolk University Interactive Campus Map features visitor-activated layers, the ability to find specific campus locations, search, and even entertaining "mouse-over" sounds for some buildings (Fenway Park, Boston Common & The Frog Pond, The Performing Arts Office & C. Walsh Theatre, etc.)

The CampusTours Awards Committee found the Suffolk University virtual tour to be a compelling and distinctive online experience, worthy of the CampusTours Four-Star Virtual Tour Award!