The MIT home page is an interactive site that informs and engages the MIT community and visitors. The Spotlight, with a changing graphic that calls attention to the new topic, supports MIT's mission of education and research, and reflects the diversity of MIT itself.

The spotlight is not a substitute for the Events Calendar where any recognized MIT group can post an event, with unlimited expansion possibilities. The spotlight is a limited resource, and we get many more requests per day than we have room to spotlight. The choice of Spotlights involves an editorial decision based on a number of factors. We consider timeliness, promotion of MIT's mission, the balance of interest to both internal and external audiences, and the appropriateness of presenting a certain face or image. More generally, we look at the cycle of balanced representation of constituents at MIT, the frequency of topics or similar topics that have been spotlighted before, and the feedback we receive via e-mail

We provide the history of links for reference, but note that some of these pages have changed since they were in the spotlight. Please write if you'd like to request a spotlight. If you'd like to submit a graphic design variation for the MIT home page, please read the Publishing Plan and Graphic Guidelines. We also have a small gallery of past designs of the MIT homepage.