Developing an online community to intrigue and raise awareness within a community is an initial step towards change. An online community with a structure that allows an interactive exchange of information is very important to an online community. As the IUPUI Common Theme project moved towards creating an initiative to allow participants on the site to exchange information in developing a community that focuses around the focal topics of the initiative. This was done by directing the user of the site through three stages of interaction. The three stages of the site structure are gaining knowledge, engagement and interacting together as a community. The level of participation of a user increases as they go through the narrative of the navigation; external applications that have been placed along the narrative to have each user (individual) become a part of a community; external applications are small online applications that bring dynamic function to the created site. The external applications used for the Common Theme project are Facebook fan page, word press blog and a Green Map built off of Google Maps. These mainstream methods of communication have been chosen by popular use of the IUPUI community and the ease of communication each interface issues the capability for the Common Theme community to reach their goals in the real world. The methods approached allowed for the opportunity to model our online community around three levels of engagement such as awareness, being engaged and taking action.

Engagement: Being Informed and Knowledgeable

Hooking an individual once they enter the online community was a very important part to having them spend the time to become knowledgeable about the Common Theme project. In addition, how important it is for IUPUI to be sustainable due to the fact that it is a commuter campus. A major application that was put into place to create a hook is the subject slider on the home page below the navigation bar. Not only is the slider�s importance symbolized by the hierarchical position but it hosts a condensed version of the narrative in a linear state from left to right. It is being used to allow the first time visitor to navigate the areas of the site, which will give the highest amount of knowledge. Each section being has high quality content with out having the visitor to commit a major amount of time understanding the information (Weber, 95 - 99).

Engagement: Participating in Dialogue

Once the visitor has been informed about the initiative the Common Theme hosts, they will then be able to enter an active conversation of the project on the Facebook page and blog. We chose to use Facebook for hosting the on going conversation since it is a mainstream method being used by the IUPUI community to socialize by the number of individuals signed up on IUPUI network. Facebook is a online community that is developed around a causal style of conversing which falls around short one to two sentence comments. If the visitor is a member of the Facebook network they will be able to invite and engage other friends in his or her inner social network thus allowing access to a greater network for the project to utilize in sharing messages and encouraging causal conversation around making IUPUI a sustainable community. Facebook did allow the creation of a Rich Site Summary or �RSS feed� to additionally make use of it for the user generated content. The RSS feed will also establish a balanced mix of casual and professional dialogue (Weber 76-80). The blog is used for the main purpose to allow other organizations and intellectuals to share their thoughts and knowledge of sustainable and the IUPUI community in a serious and professional manner. A blog is developed for longer written pieces between five hundred and eight hundred words, each article written allows written comments but the focus is set on the written piece more than the comments. Adding dynamic content from Facebook and the blog to the site encourages visitors to revisit the site and blog. Organizations that are involved as a guest writer will have a value of self worth by creating a sustainable campus within the Common Theme Project. Both of these interactive entities are marketed heavily on the home page but also on the right hand side of every secondary content page giving the opportunity for a visitor to engage with the applications if they have a thought or a moment of inspiration to share (Weber, 88-90).

Engagement: Taking Action

Taking action is a critical step towards making IUPUI a sustainable community as the community engages in conversation. The method used to initiate action within the engaged is by utilizing the Green Map application. This application runs off of the Google maps Application Programming Interface (API). It allows members of the community to interact with the map to find sustainable location around the city such as farmers markets, local gardens and recycling centers to just name a few. Each location on the map allows for user comments and a rating scale on the map for quick synthesis of the validity towards the site on the map. The visitor of the Common Theme site has now been involved in a community effort by participating in the Green Map. The map provides a visual interpretation of the physical relationship to conversations and information being presented on the site, giving the community motivation to participate and a better understanding of the local component of the topics. It also takes people away from depending on a virtual environment to conduct conversation since communicating in the physical environment is not as powerful or productive by virtual means.

Engagement: Using a Mental Model Theory

The theory that this structure of community takes on is extending individual hands to form community handshakes. Society today has formed a habit of being able to avoid the experienceof the unwanted (Mcluhan, 26). Expressways have exploited us to this way of thinking and we�ve progressed to a mindset that is brought to fruition our present methods of communication. It is now easier for neighbors in a community to communicate through the web than it is for them to gather at the local coffee shop or neighbors� house. This transformation has proved that neighbors who communicate by email are more active in the community than the neighbors who do not (Keeble, 23-24). However, when looking at the IUPUI community we are engaging multiple demographics to one group, so how can we engage these people. Issuing the Common Theme project through an online community does this. Keeping people engaged is the true test at the strength of the community.
Connection needs to be personal leading the path towards person-to-person communication. Person to person communication is when two or more people communicate by email, instant messages and video or audio chat. Person to person communication proved to be true in 1994 with the Cyber Mind project that was an early form of the web 2.0 online communities of today. Individuals involved with this project became interested due to the subject luring them to be active in Cyber Mind. They stayed because of the informal discussion mixed with the professional. As each participant contributed to the discussion they felt a stronger sense of community (CyberMind 254). The research towards the design of the Common Theme online community wanted to take this full circle into strengthening the physical community of IUPUI.
The overall theory of the multi tiered online community is to take the person to person developed connection of the site to a face to face interaction in the environment the community exists in. Face to face communication is how it sounds, two people or more people communicating in a physical environment. Image 1-1 is used to demonstrate the full circle theory. The engage section in the site map represents the person-to-person communication which directs focus towards the project�s topics and being informed of the initiatives. This type of engagement is interactive in the sense that it allows users to react to comments and articles made utilizing Facebook and the blog. These media were necessary due to the fact that strangers tend to not interact nor communicate in face-to-face environments any more. Although it is argued that both forms of communication are necessary to form a sustainable community (Keeble, 31 - 38).