NEWBIE │UX research & design

NEWBIE

Concept:

Every newbie should have a manual.

Brief:

Develop a solution using human-centred design processes to help improving educational experiences for new immigrants.

Co-develop with Natalie Thornley.

#UXDesign #UXResearch #UIDesign #HumanCentredDesign

Execution:

As part of the introduction course to human-centred design, we decided to tackle the challenge of improving educational experiences for new immigrants by giving them a tool they could use to learn and communicate.

We started the project researching the problem and the target audience by using different research methods:

Learning from people
Learning from experts
Immersing ourselves in the context
Analogous inspiration

We synthesise these learnings to learn how might help solving the problem before prototyping and implementing with the target.

The solution was to create an app that would give the users tools to adapt to their new home by understanding and learning places to go, slang language, etc.

*2020

Human-centred design process

Due to the current pandemic we are facing, the team communicated using remote tools such as MIRO, ZOOM and other social media channels to contact the target audience for the research process.

Teaming up with Natalie Thornley, we decided to face the challenge of improving educational experiences for new immigrants. To gain a better understanding of this problem, we followed the human-centred design method: inspiration, ideation and implementation.

INSPIRATION

To create meaningful and useful solutions we have to understand people's need. To do so, we immerse ourselves to gain a better understanding of their needs and aspirations.

We collected our thoughts on what we did know and didn't know from the problem, to then start researching through 4 methods:

- Learn from people: asking international students to answer questions through an online form to understand their experiences.

- Learn from experts: asking UK based teachers about their own experience with international students.

- Immersing ourselves in context: we had experienced being an international student before and so we brought our knowledge and memories form these times.

- Seeking Analogous inspiration: exploring similar experiences such as being a new employee.

We collected the outcomes in a MIRO board using sticky notes to visualise and organise the data.

Example of questions

Screenshots of MIRO board with findings from the different research methods.

IDEATION

This phase transformed our research findings into insights that shaped our design.

We grouped our findings in themes, these into insights and 'how might we' to then get our final ideas that would answer the challenge.

1. We had a primary selection using notes of the most interesting facts shared during our research stage.

2. Grouped our findings and collected the 'gems' we thought were more accurate to our challenge. Using MIRO we grouped the 'gems', clustered them into themes - language, social, environment, culture and training. We found evidence in our post-it wall and refined the final groups.

3. We highlighted three insights in each theme and created 'how might we' statements to help us solve the challenge.

Evolution of thinking process refining the themes.

IDEATION - PROTOTYPING

We turned the opportunities for design into concepts of design.

After a brainstorming session to generate ideas that would answer the different 'how might we' statements, we decided to move forward on the idea of creating an app - NEWBIE- that would work as a guide, social media and resource for new immigrants. The app is a 360º guide with information about places to go, things to do, language support, culture tips, meet-ups, etc.

From brainstorming to storytelling, we created user personas to enhance our designs to the users.

Once we decided on the idea, we mapped the app's home screen and develop different wireframes to then create the final prototype of the homepage.

Final idea of creating a guide to help new immigrants in their new homes.

Most innovative and accurate ideas to answer the challenge grouped and developed. We rated the different ideas to then chose the final one

User persona and storyboard to help us refine our idea.

Once we decided the idea, we mapped the app's home screen and created different wireframes.

Some of the wireframes and final app design using FIGMA. The home screen hosts all the sections of the app, you can also go into your profile and have a help section. The city and welcome message would be adapted to the users.

IMPLEMENTATION

Finally, we brought the solution into life, keeping the people we're looking to serve at the heart of the process.

All feedback was positive, only mentioning some tweaks on the top menu buttons that were removed to help with a clean homepage, usable and accessible.

Newbie is an informative, interactive and social platform for immigrants coming to study in a new environment/country.

The platform provides information and recommendations of places to eat, urban dictionary, maps, cultural tips, meet-ups, safety advice, etc.

Based on our research, 80% of students we spoke to said they struggled to adapt toa new culture and so there was a lack of support for new immigrants to settle in from things like understanding language slang, safe places to go, etc.

By designing Newbie as an interactive platform where they can, not only find information but also contribute to it to help fellow immigrants students adapt to their new surroundings we ensure they can find all the things they need to succeed in their new home.

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