Project Background
Completed over the junior and senior years, Senior Projects represent Ross students’ abilities to tackle real-world issues by synthesizing multiple skill sets. With the help of Mentors of their choice, students create a Final Product, which is presented in a school-wide exhibition, during which they share their creative process in a presentation to the school and outside guests. The process of transforming rough ideas and raw material to finished product over a sustained period of research and development fosters expertise in a subject area and student confidence.
For many years, Senior projects happen in Ross School and this project is an attempt to bring this offline experience online in order to facilitate process documentation and communication on students' end, and to standardize both new projects creation and production process archiving of past projects at Ross School. My role in this project is the UX designer, working with one UI designer and key stakeholders such as Dean of Senior Project, Director of Media, School Leadership and Academic Council . Wireframe and prototypes were created and handed over to developer after walkthrough meetings and inquiry sessions.
For many years, Senior projects happen in Ross School and this project is an attempt to bring this offline experience online in order to facilitate process documentation and communication on students' end, and to standardize both new projects creation and production process archiving of past projects at Ross School. My role in this project is the UX designer, working with one UI designer and key stakeholders such as Dean of Senior Project, Director of Media, School Leadership and Academic Council . Wireframe and prototypes were created and handed over to developer after walkthrough meetings and inquiry sessions.
The Need
#1 Lack of Standardized ProcessEven though there were plenty documentations on how Senior Projects should happen for both mentors and students, these documents were not well organized and no overarching process were outline. A lot of the steps were open to interpretation by the participants.
Since seniors of high school and the mentors of their picks are the main participants in this components, there's a new generation of users each year, and users' experience accumulated during the current school year doesn't get passed onto future generations. As a result, users spend an abundant amount of time figuring out the forms they need to fill out rather than doing creative work for the project. In an ideal world, administrative process should serve the participants and guide them along the way, not create unnecessary burdens. |
Often empty blog spaces
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#2 Lack of Documentation on Student-Mentor CollaborationSenior Project website and blogs were created in 2014 and blogs had been created by students for each individual project since then. Such setup attempted to promote documentation of the design process as well as centralize and digitalize student-mentor communication.
However, results turned out to be unsatisfactory and vary by individuals. Common cases were that one or two entries were posted to the blog and no replies were made for a project. Students and mentors often chose to have face to face meetings infrequently, or only when crisis occur. Mentors did not check in with students regularly on their progress, and had limited communication with students. |
#3 Unsatisfying Past Projects' Archive on Process and PresentationAs a result of the non-mandatory and supervision-free blog maintenance and voluntary online communication, the blog spaces on the Senior Project site were quite deserted. But the 2014 blog solution was already an improvement to past project archiving. Before 2014, projects archiving practice were at the discretion of Dean of Senior Project, and could vary from year to year. Poor documentation makes it hard not only for assessment to be fairly conducted on the projects, but also for future seniors to reference old exemplars. Each poorly archived project is a loss of valuable history to the school.
In addition, the lack of tagging functionality also made the digitally archived projects impossible to filter or sort. Anyone looking for a specific past project needed to remember precisely the year and the name of the student to be able to pinpoint it. The potential advantage of document digitalization was not fully realized. |
User Research
Key Questions
What is not working at the moment in the offline experience? |
What is the process of Sr. Project in an ideal world? |
Is every step along the way worth to be digitized and archived? |
MethodologyI had several interviews with the Dean of Senior Project to sort out the existing process. During these meetings we also talked about the issues existed in current process. We thoroughly went through each step and evaluated whether a digitized versions of such steps could potentially solve the problem and increase efficiency in the workflow.
I further conducted interviews with current students and mentors to listen to their needs and pain points they experienced so far. Notes of these interviews were further analyzed and organized to see where these needs overlap most. User journey maps were produced for each type of user in the workflow. |
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Implications
The Dean of Senior Project took too much responsibilities on her shoulder. This heavy reliability on one person is a huge risk that could jeopardize the smoothness of the process. Mentors are key resources that can be utilized to share some burdens. However, current engagement level of students and mentors varies case by case. There were highly collaborative student-mentor examples in which communications happened on weekly or even daily basis. However, there were also reports from interviewees that showed more lay back relationships. Mentors expressed that they have limited access to students progress on their projects. There were no mandated updates on the students' side, so the mentors' activeness was largely dependent on student's frequency of initiating contact. Furthermore, more than 2/3 of the interviewees expressed that it took them a long time to figure out the steps, milestones and deadlines and a lot of energy was spent on figuring out the process and requirements. By solving the problems listed above, there is a good chance that mentors' engagement in the process will increase and the workload balance will be healthier.
Design Process
Understanding WorkflowUser journey maps produced in the research phase were further consolidated into a cross-functional workflow to mimic the process how Senior Projects took place at Ross School. The person responsible was specified for each step in the chart to visualize the handovers between users. Each step was further discussed with Dean of Senior Project to determine if there's value for the digitalization of such step.
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Defining MilestonesThe steps in the flowchart were further organized into several major categories. These categories were defined as "Milestones" and the mark of completion of each stage inside the milestones were defined. Steps that are non essential in the process were removed from the milestones. Some of theses steps were connected to a separate system (for example, material purchase expenses & book purchase orders), and digitalizing them in this design will not provide extra value.
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WireframesWireframes were created for the processes and milestones defined above. The key design philosophy was to create specific workspaces and functionalities for each user.
For students, their main workspace is the process folio. Guided by the milestone indicators, students will add appropriate entries to the process folio to document their steps along the way. Upon submission of the entries, corresponding users (mentor, dean, etc.) will be notified to carry out the next steps. For mentors, they share a similar view as the students process folio, where they can open the entries of the students they are mentoring and perform the required actions specific to the entry. Some mentor specific entries (for example, suggestion of resources) can also be added to the students' timeline. With this interface, the mentors can easily keep track of the students' progress and intervene in a timely manner. Dean of Senior Project has a unique workspace where she can quickly access all students progress and perform Dean specific tasks. She also has an interface where she can perform bulk actions to all/selected students, such as announce deadlines and send notifications. Finally, she has a parallel interface where past projects are archived and can be retrieved through year, topic, medium, domain, etc. User testing were conducted on each user group with corresponding components and feedbacks were collected. With user feedback data, I further negotiated with Dean of Senior Project to simplify the entry fields (especially long text fields) in the required forms and eliminate several less essential steps. |
Testing Round 1
Low-fidelity prototypes were created in inVision with wireframes above to conduct user-testing. Moderated user testing was conducted with stakeholders to verify that design intentions captured the essence of the process. I watched users making sense of—or failing to make sense of—the interface and interactions I created. Based on our learnings, the design team stormed solutions to eliminate sources of friction and confusion and repeat the cycle.
Testing Round 3 Planned
Due to lack of real data to yield additional insights from further testing, the design team planned to conduct next round of testing after the product launches. The unique nature of this product (for example, users complete the journey map over the course of a year) made it hard for the design team to be sure that some key goals will be achieved. The design team has planned to keep track of user engagement after product launch, in the hope to see a dramatic increase in students' process folio posts and student-mentor interactions.
Handoff
To DeveloperAnnotated wireframes and prototypes were delivered to developers when design work was wrapped up. A style guide was delivered along with the prototypes. A walkthrough meeting was held upon handoff. A few quick Q&A sessions were conducted afterwards. It is now under development.
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To UserProduct was scheduled to be released before April, 2019. User Acceptance Test will be conducted on product release. Upon approval of the product, this component will be used for school year 2019-2020.
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Reflection
Lessons Learned
I spent most time in this project finalizing key steps of Senior Projects, trying to make sure I did not misunderstood any of these steps, but more importantly, to make sure I was not forcing the stakeholders into any steps or solutions in the online experience. Taking an offline workflow online is very challenging, as some tend to follow the steps they witnessed offline literally, without serious consideration whether the workflow itself can be better optimized for a digital world. Stakeholders can be demanding from time to time, and will often feel unhappy when forced out of a comfort zone. But a good communication between designers and stakeholders can go a long way in these situations.
One unique thing about this project is that while there will be a new generation of students and mentors every year, the admin side of the process has been driven by one person (Dean of Senior Project) for the past 15 years. Making sure that the Dean is happy with the design was extremely important for me, because at the end of the day, other users can move on with their lives after the project is over, but the Dean is the one who faces the tool every day. Her fluency in the system and support to other users will be the most critical factor to the success of this component.
The last thing I learned during this process is that when designing a system for periodically occurring events, flexibility is also something important to consider. During the design process, I had to repeatedly check with stakeholders which steps are absolutely fixed in the process, and which need flexibility. We eventually figured out a system that deadlines can be set independently each year by the Dean, and the milestone progress indicator on students' process folio interface will dynamically adjust the content according to the setup. We made sure that even though there's a future change in the process, the system will be able to accommodate the needs.
One unique thing about this project is that while there will be a new generation of students and mentors every year, the admin side of the process has been driven by one person (Dean of Senior Project) for the past 15 years. Making sure that the Dean is happy with the design was extremely important for me, because at the end of the day, other users can move on with their lives after the project is over, but the Dean is the one who faces the tool every day. Her fluency in the system and support to other users will be the most critical factor to the success of this component.
The last thing I learned during this process is that when designing a system for periodically occurring events, flexibility is also something important to consider. During the design process, I had to repeatedly check with stakeholders which steps are absolutely fixed in the process, and which need flexibility. We eventually figured out a system that deadlines can be set independently each year by the Dean, and the milestone progress indicator on students' process folio interface will dynamically adjust the content according to the setup. We made sure that even though there's a future change in the process, the system will be able to accommodate the needs.
Tools Used
Other Projects
Curriculum PagesA redesign of existing curriculum pages to encourage daily uses by solving the UX and data structural issues. Responsibility in the team: UX designer.
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Other RLS ComponentsA bird eye view of other RLS components I had worked on in 2018 as the UX designer.
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Professional DevelopmentA custom designed online learning platform to accommodate special need of Ross School for its Professional Development and Certificate program. Responsibility in the team: lead instructional designer, UX designer.
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Evolution of ConsciousnessAn example course produced under Professional Development project that consists interactive and innovative activities that facilitates learning. Responsibility in the team: lead instructional designer, UX designer.
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Interactive GlossaryAn interactive glossary that facilitates the learning in Professional Courses and highlights the connections between related concepts in the same contest. Responsibility in the team: UX designer.
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GMAT All in OneGMAT courses completely redesigned for E-learning environment and online community. A complete commercial project with full and successful implementation. More than 5,000 students enrolled up to Dec, 2018. Responsibility in the team: instructor, instructional designer, content developer, UX designer.
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Step-by-Step ExerciseBuilt from scratch, this application is designed specifically to help Chinese GMAT test takers prepare and practice Reading Comprehension, and in the meantime, facilitate students from All in One courses to internalize what's been taught in class. Single-handedly designed and developed the application. Responsibilities include: data tidying, system architect, UI/UX designer, developer, user testing.
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