UTD E-Learning Redesign
Role: UX researcher
2020 DESIGN CHALLENGE WINNDER
Sining Wu from Alpha Team, alongside Chen Song and Zhengsi Chang, won first place in the 2020 Design Challenge. They were recognized for their innovative design, which was developed through extensive user research, creative problem-solving, and design-thinking. Their design shows great potential to benefit the UT Dallas community.
Video Presentation link: https://youtu.be/151Vj4h9f-0
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
We redesigned the dashboard/home page of the eLearning platform, along with the Class page and Wiki page. Our new design focuses on enhancing learning management, boosting class engagement, and facilitating collaborative study.
ROLE & RESPONSIBILITIES
My primary role was as a UX researcher. I was responsible for various activities including writing research plans, conducting interviews, validating and analyzing data, creating presentations and research reports, planning workshops, and collaborating with designers.
TEAM
Zhengsi Chang
UX Researcher
Saniya Wu
UX Researcher
Molly Song
UX Designer
DESIGN PLAN & TIMELINE
COMPETITOR ANALYSIS
FEEDBACK ANALYSIS
USER INTERVIEW
PERSONA
PROFILE
"I am an international student. I transferred from Collin college. I have a heavy class load and a 14-hour part-time job. "
STUDY GOAL
"My goal after UTD is go to medical school to gain a solid foundation of knowledge that will help me succeed in medical school and for my job. "
SCENARIO
TYPICAL DAY
FLIPPED CLASSROOM
JOURNEY MAP
PROBLEM 1
High anxiety to miss assignments and classes
PROBLEM 2
Too many external learning apps
PROBLEM 3
Course materials are not well-organized
PROBLEM 4
Unfamiliar with new schools systems, like grading or scheduling
POTENTIAL SOLUTION
We decided to introduce a dashboard designed to help students manage their learning, a class page that displays course materials and supports a flipped classroom model, and a Wiki page that fosters communication among students.
Dashboard
Class
Wiki
2 ITERATIONS
DASHBOARD
Initially, we included a calendar as the main feature and an inbox for communication. However, user testing revealed that students preferred to see class information first. We also learned that students often struggle to remember their classmates' names and faces, so adding this information to the inbox would be beneficial.
First Round Design
Second Round Design
CLASS
Originally, on the class page, course materials were organized by week, with grade information and improvement tips at the top of the page. However, during user testing, we found that users preferred to be directed immediately to the section for the current week as soon as they logged onto the class page.
First Round Design
Second Round Design
WIKI
On the Wiki page, students have the ability to collaborate in real-time and can instantly communicate using a chatbox. In the second iteration of the design, we made changes to clearly display who contributed to each part of the content.
First Round Design
Second Round Design
FINAL DESIGN
Learning Management
Dashboard
Class Engagement
Class
Collaborative Study
Wiki