This may be a silly question but I don't get it. Maybe I am bringing bad habits in from other coding I have done.
Take a simple set up like the below in the _layout.cshtml file
<li><a asp-area="" asp-controller="Instructors" asp-action="Index">Instructors</a></li>
<li><a asp-area="" asp-controller="Departments" asp-action="Index">Departments</a></li>
For discussion, why couldn't this be written:
string description = "Instructors"
<li><a asp-area="" asp-controller=description asp-action="Index">description</a></li>
description = "Departments"
<li><a asp-area="" asp-controller=description asp-action="Index">description</a></li>
And if this is possible why not set up a table and foreach through the table to populate the navbar as required?