2. Grammar and symbols

Exclamation points: If they can be avoided, do not use exclamation points.

Headlines and titles: Use sentence case, so that the headline and subheadings of your webpages are lowercase, with the exception of the first letter and proper nouns/program names.

Example: “Kyle Douglas honored for excellence in teaching”

Symbols: Don't use ampersands (&) unless one is part of a company, brand, or department name.

Use the shorter en dash “–” (option -) with spaces on either side instead of the longer em dash “—” to set off extra information, such as examples, explanations, or supplemental facts. Example: Douglas is a structural engineer with a deep understanding of the central role – and key challenges – of concrete in the world today.

Use the serial comma to separate items in a list. Example: The Centennial Teaching Assistant Awards were presented to eight graduate students for their tremendous service and dedication in providing excellent classroom instruction as teaching assistants: Nina Berlin Rubin (Earth System Science), Caroline Blythe (Earth systems), Erica Bower (Emmett Interdisciplinary Program in Environment and Resources), Thom Chaffee (Geophysics), Ellie Fajer (Earth systems), Lina Fowler (Sustainability Science and Practice), Sarah Hickernell (Earth & Planetary Sciences), Xunfeng Lu (Energy Science & Engineering).

Time: Use numerals and a.m. or p.m., with a space in between. Do not use minutes for on-the-hour time.
 Example: 7 a.m. or
 7:30 p.m.

• Use a hyphen between times to indicate a time period.
 Example: 7 a.m.-10:30 p.m.

The entries below include some of the most relevant entries from the University Communications Style Guide with school-specific additions.