The challenge
Overcoming the information overload
Throughout my university life, I've witnessed a number of students struggling with seeking help. New students are expected to navigate their social and academic school life with little to no experience. Students are often overwhelmed with huge waves of information thrown at them, but don't know how to ask for help when they are in need.
The goal is to provide information access for students
I am very passionate to help my friends at the university using my design skills. My goal is to build a product that addresses the problem of scattered information and help students easily get the support they need.
The solution
A mobile app reinventing the help-seeking experience
Find Quick Answers to your Questions
Search for available school resources and find quick answers
Click on quick links to explore existing programs and services provided by the school
Use the “Q&A” function to post your questions, get answers from peers, and comment to help others
Find Mentors in your Field of Interests
Explore mentors from different programs, years of study, and cultural backgrounds
Search for mentors with specific backgrounds using filters
Learn details about mentors through their profiles
Connect and Learn from Mentors
Book a session from the mentor profile page
Select from dates and times that best suit your schedule
Answer questions customized by mentors to help them know you better
Design progress
Embracing iterative design in my process
Empathize
Starting with a survey to uncover general patterns
To understand the problem space, I distributed an online survey to students across 3 campuses. I narrowed down our research scope and identified some general trends of problems faced by students. In such a way, I avoided diving into in-depth research too early.
Objective 1
To understand how do students currently seek help
Objective 2
To investigate the current barriers that prevent students to get effective support
I've revealed some interesting patterns after analyzing the survey responses, which inform the next step of research (i.e. interview).
Students primarily rely on online information searches
🔍 Lower-year students predominantly resort to online information searches (58.5%) as their primary means of seeking help.
❓ Implications on subsequent interview study:
It seems that students prioritize information searching online, over seeking help from individuals around them. I would conduct interviews to delve deeper into the underlying causes associated with this pattern.
Students are unaware of school resources available for support
🔍 78.3% of students attempted to seek help, yet 44.7% reported limited assistance, indicating a lack of familiarity with the school's available resources.
❓ Implications on subsequent interview study:
The findings substantiated my initial hypothesis that the current school tools are inadequate in addressing the confusion faced by new students. This prompted me to investigate the knowledge gaps that hinder students from effectively utilizing the available resources at school.
Building upon survey findings, I conducted interviews for in-depth understanding
While surveys allowed me to reach a larger audience, I also conducted interviews to generate more detailed qualitative data.
I set the interview objectives based on survey findings:
Objective 1
To identify the specific challenges faced by help-seeking students
Objective 2
To understand students' preferred help-seeking forms
I found the following findings through affinity mapping:
Information is scattered online
The scattered distribution of information makes it difficult for students to locate resources specific to their needs.
Cultural and language barriers
Because of cultural and language barriers, international students often feel nervous when attempting to ask for help.
Barriers to personal interaction
The pandemic has created difficulties for students in establishing person-to-person contact.
The need for personalized assistance
Majority of participants expressed a belief that person-to-person contact offers personalized solutions to their problems
📍 Insights from interviews complement survey findings
While the survey data indicated that most students seek support online, interview findings showed that students prioritize personal interaction but are hindered by obstacles like COVID-19 social distancing rules preventing them from doing so.
Designing for students seeking personalized support
I created a persona using research findings, which serves as a constant reference point throughout my design journey.
Objective 1
To identify the specific challenges faced by help-seeking students
Objective 2
To understand students' preferred help-seeking forms
I found the following findings through affinity mapping:
Define
Articulating the design challenge
Incorporating research insights, I framed a problem statement for my primary user group - the help-seeking new students:
Students new to the campus seek personalized support tailored to their specific challenges, as they encounter scattered online information, cultural and language barriers, and a lack of straightforward school resources.
I created user job stories that help me identify challenges faced by users. For each job story, I came up with a corresponding design requirement that specify what my design should do to help users complete their tasks.
🤔 Job story 1
When I face challenges in school life, I need information about available resources, so I can effectively address my issues.
💡 Design requirement 1
The design should enables new students to easily explore and familiarize themselves with all the university's available resources
🤔 Job story 2
When I feel stressed about my school life, I need someone to talk to, so I can receive personalized support tailored to my situation.
💡 Design requirement 2
The design should facilitate seamless access for students to easily connect with someone for personalized support.
Ideation
How Might We ... support new students in receiving personalized support and effectively using campus resources?
I brainstormed a number of ideas with the team and narrowed down these ideas to the 3 that best resonated with user pain points. We felt like all 3 ideas would be highly beneficial to our users, so we combined them together into one coherent design.
Starting with a survey to uncover general patterns
The Information board
The information board empowers students to find quick answers independently, and educate students about available resources. It encourages self-exploration before seeking mentor assistance.
Get matched with a mentor
Upon onboarding, students are matched with mentors (upper-year students or alumni), based on their backgrounds. This design fosters personalized support through direct interaction between students and mentors.
Book a mentoring session
When booking a session, students answers some pre-session questions asked by mentors. This design facilitates more personalized assistance by allowing mentors to learn more about each students' unique situation.
Validating initial design concepts
To validate design concepts, I gathered feedback from potential users by showcasing our sketches and the storyboard. Although most feedback was positive, users expressed a preference for searching mentors themselves instead of being matched. Based on this feedback, I decided to allow students to search for mentors using filters and sorting options.
📍 This approach also adheres to Jakob Nielsen's usability heuristic of providing users with control and freedom in interaction design.
Design & Test
Conceptualizing the overall structure and layout
The design concepts were combined to create a mentorship app where users seek help by exploring the information board or booking sessions with mentors.
The information board
The information board serves as the homepage, enabling students to explore and efficiently utilize the school's existing services and resources before scheduling a session with a mentor.
✅ Meet design requirement 1: The design should enables new students to easily explore and familiarize themselves with all the university's available resources.
Mentor search
In response to feedback from potential users, we opted to allow students to search for mentors rather than relying on a matching system. This decision empowers students with greater control over the mentor selection process.
✅ Meet design requirement 2: The design should facilitate seamless access for students to easily connect with someone for personalized support.
Book a mentorship session
Booking a mentoring session is effortless, accomplished in a few simple steps. Upon submission, the mentor will review the request, and students will receive notifications once the booking is confirmed.
✅ Meet design requirement 2: The design should facilitate seamless access for students to easily connect with someone for personalized support.
In-person user testing with paper prototype
To assess the usability of the design, I ran two types of user testings:
1) Cognitive walkthrough, where 5 classmates in our UX design course participated in usability testings. They were guided through a series of tasks using our test recipe. The testing approach focused on specific tasks to evaluate usability.
2) Think-aloud sessions, where we tested with 5 representative users, comprising 3 lower-year students and 2 upper-year students, prompting them to vocalize their thoughts while completing tasks.
Paper prototype for usability testing
Running a think-aloud session with paper prototype
I observed their reactions, took notes, and conducted post-test interviews to capture their attitudes towards the product experience. The insights I gathered were addressed in the next iteration.
Iterative improvements guided by test findings
Final Design
An all-in-one app for information hub and mentorship
Learnings
📍 Effective storytelling
I discovered that effective storytelling - by presenting different design options and providing a clear rationale for my design choices - can help gain buy-in from the stakeholders.
📍 Avoid assumptions
There are experiences that I will never have. This is exactly why I have to talk to users and trust my research. I should always be aware of my biases to avoid making any assumptions.
📍 Document my design decisions
Documenting my design decisions preserves the rationale behind my work, facilitating team collaboration and effective communication with stakeholders.