Notable Research Projects
User Research for Mass-Ed’s Digital Dashboards
UX Researcher, UX Writer
User Research and Design Iterations
6 months
Problem Space
(modified due to NDA)
Online education struggles with engaging students. Both students and instructors report dissatisfaction with virtual learning. Students tend to not absorb the content as efficiently as when they are in-person while instructors find it hard to gauge how they are performing or what they can do to improve their instruction.
Research Question
How might we improve Mass-Ed’s real-time dashboard and post-class dashboard to more effectively communicate holistic measures of student engagement in virtual classes such that they provide instructors with immediate and actionable insights for how to improve their instruction?
UX Research Methods
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Longitudinal Surveys
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Semi-structured Interviews
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Usability Testing
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Competitive Analysis
Deliverables Produced
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User Feedback Report
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Recommendation Report
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​Heuristic Evaluation
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User Flow Diagrams
Impact
The Mass-Ed team fully redesigned both dashboards as part of a new version of the product. Proposed design changes and new features were incorporated into the redesign based off of user research.
UX Research for UC Berkeley’s Student Information System: 'CalCentral'
UX Researcher
User Research and Design Iterations
3 months
Final Research Report and Presentation
Problem Space
CalCentral users are overall discontent and tend to feel that the website has yet to reach its goal of simplifying and unifying the UC Berkeley online experience by bringing together student data into a personalized, mobile-friendly dashboard and digital assistant, that draws from dozens of campus sources.
Research Objective
Identify opportunities for improvement in CalCentral’s homepage by recognizing how the page can utilize space more effectively and investigating which existing features are not serving students properly, as well as what new features they could benefit from.
UX Research Methods
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Cross-sectional Survey
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Structured Interview
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Moderated Open Card Sorting and Closed Card Sorting
Deliverables Produced
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Research Report and Presentation
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Journey map & Personas
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Proposed Sitemap
Impact
Through stratified sampling recruiting efforts we collected enough rich feedback to convincingly make design proposals to the client, UC Berkeley, who have begun to implement changes to CalCentral (such as a redesigned homepage with relocated and regrouped contents) based on our recommendations.
Lab Research Study: ‘Assessing the Effect of Shade Materials on View Clarity’
Research Lab Assistant
Academic Research
3 months
Problem Space
View Clarity is a key aspect of View Quality. View Quality has been shown experimentally to positively affect thermal comfort, emotion, and cognitive performance. Shade materials can negatively affect View Clarity.
Research Objective
‘Develop an assessment work flow of the effect of different shade materials on view clarity.’
Research Study Design
Dependent variables were subjective perceptions on view—through survey responses—and human visual performance metrics from object-based research techniques involving visual acuity, contrast sensitivity, and color sensitivity tests. The data were then examined in relation to the independent variables of differences in shade materials (visible light transmittance) and differing ‘window view’ images, which were presented to subjects in a controlled lab setting designed to mimic an office setting of a desk next to a window.
Impact
Results ‘provide the basis for a study under daylight conditions that aims to develop a new View Clarity Index. The new View Clarity Index is intended to provide designers with guidance on selecting facade materials.’