PROJECT OVERVIEW

Academy Hive

Academy Hive is a mobile responsive web design project that was created as part of Designlabs UX bootcamp course.

Academy Hive is an educational platform that encourages users to make social connections while learning a new skill. Users can apply to online courses, earn achievement badges, socialize with other users, and participate in community challenges and live stream lessons.

Our core values for the brand are creativity, fun, encouragement, and education. Academy Hive is a positive space where users are free to learn at their own pace and connect with other users.

Strategy planning

Role

User Research

Visual Design

Branding

Interactive Design

Tool

Figma

Adobe Illustrator

Duration

6 Weeks

Problem

In the beginning, the hypothesis was that people who don’t have social support systems in their personal lives are less likely to continue trying to learn a new skill.

People need a space where they can find a community while they are learning a new skill..

Solution

The project’s solution was to develop a space where users can connect with other people while going through an online course.

The website needs to offer a sense of community and social support for people who need emotional support during their learning journey.

Goal

The research’s goal was to determine the needs and pain points of self-taught learners. It was important to determine the top priority needs early in the research stage, so Academy Hive could address those important needs.

Research Stage

The research stage closely examine the problem in order to find the best solutions for the problem. This stage closely explores the current trends in online educational platforms and social media website, defines user’s needs and point points, and develops some possible solutions for the problem.

Competitive Analysis

It was important to observe what were the current trends in educational websites. This research helped define what type of features and services that will best appeal to the users.

The competitive analysis was a detailed SWOT analysis of popular educational websites, Duolingo, Khan Academy, and Udemy, and social media website YouTube and Reddit.

Interviews

The interviews were conducted remotely over the course of two weeks. The participants range in age from 20 to 60 years old, and varied in educational backgrounds.

Key Takeaways From The Interviews

The participants mentioned how important it was to have a flexible schedule. For example, One participant explained he needed to follow the “Just in Time” learning method because of his fast-paced work schedule.

Some participants really wanted emotional support from people in their personal social circle or from their mentors. These participants explained that family and friendships were important reasons why they kept trying to improve on their skills.

The participants expressed that they didn’t want to waste too much time trying to find resources or going through the resources. Overall, they don’t want to watch long videos, complete boring tasks, or read overly long articles. They prefer short, simple, and accurate information.

Affinity Mapping

User Personas

The interviews conducted during the research phase informed the creation of the user personas. I categorized the participants into two groups: people who want emotional support and people who just want results. The website needs to offer a sense of community and social support for people who need emotional support during their learning journey.

The website must allow users a sense of schedule flexibility during their learning journey. Everyone will have different perspectives, educational levels, and schedules, so Academy Hive needed to be simple, accessible, and flexible.

Persona 1: Wants Social Support

Persona 2: Wants Independence

Research POVs

1. I’d like to explore ways to help people who want emotional support in their learning process connect with other like-minded people, because they feel motivated and validated when they see other people make active progress towards their learning goals.

2. I’d like to explore ways to help people who do not have a lot of spare time quickly find reliable necessary resources for their learning goals, because they become frustrated and de-motivated when they stay stuck on a problem for too long.

3. I’d like to explore ways to help people who want to discover tasks that are short and simple, because they feel validated when they can complete tasks that are interesting, quick, and relevant to their learning goals.

Research HMW

1. How might we help users find learning tasks that meaningfully connect with their learning goals?

2. How might we help users feel confident that completing their learning tasks is a productive way to meet their learning goals?

3. How might we reduce users’ frustration if they are experiencing a skill plateau while they are working on their learning tasks?

User Flows

Task Flows

Card Sorting

Site Mapping

Research Wrap-Up

In short, the research findings showed that users want an online educational website that respected their busy lives. People value social connection. Some people want mentors, while other people just want to connect with other learners. No one wanted to feel socially obligated to join a group learning environment.

The website needed to be flexible so people can learn at their pace and socialize at their own time and comfort.

Branding Design Concepts

Users can enroll in self pace courses, join community forums, earn achievements, and participate in live stream lessons learn alongside other users.

During this stage, I developed the brand design, visual assets, wireframes, and the prototype test.

Branding Design

The brand’s name and aesthetics were based on the stereotypical characteristics of a bumblebee. Bumblebees are bright, social, fast, and hardworking. Plus, bumblebees already have a cultural association with education, e.g. “Spelling Bee Competitions”. I created ten different logo designs, and I asked my mentor and my peers for their feedback.

The website targets adults who want to learn a new skill for work purposes and personal enrichment. Academy Hive includes eight different education courses: Development, Business, Marketing, Language, Design, Music & Audio Design, Health & Fitness, and Personal Development. Users can enroll in self pace courses, join community forums, earn achievements, and participate in live stream lessons learn alongside other users.

Academy Hive Lo-Fi Logo Designs

Uit Kit

Logo Design Concepts

Academy Hive Lo-Fi Icon Designs

Mid Fidelity Wireframes

The mid fidelity wireframes showcases the core features of the platform.

The goal progress section is a part of the user’s profile. Here, users track their own progress with courses, personalized goals, and achievement badges. Users can also create reflection entries so they can document their perspectives while they are learning a new skill. This feature allows users to reflect critically on themselves, their progress, and take a moment to consider their next steps.

The platform must accommodate the needs of two different groups; independent learners and social learners. For that reason, all courses are self-pace. Users have the option to connect with other users in the community forums, or they can simply complete the courses on their own. The community forums are a space where people can share their progress, ask questions, and give feedback to other people.

Overall, participants liked the concepts, but some features confused them. For instance, most participants didn’t understand the “goal” tracker. Participants were confused about whether the “goals” were connected with the courses or if the “goals” were a distinct category of activities. My mentor also advised me to consider the programing side of the project development. The wireframes showed a progress tracker for the goals, but it wasn’t clear how the system could track the users’ progress with their goal.

The mid fidelity wireframes showed some good concepts and features. But I needed to simplify and reworked many aspects in order to make the platform simple, easy to navigate, and appealing to the users.

The mid fidelity wireframes look over the homepage, goal progress section, course section, and community forums.

Mid Fidelity Wireframes Close Up

High Fidelity Wireframes

The high fidelity wireframes expand on the concepts from the mid fidelity wireframes and resolve the issues that the last group of participants mentioned before. I removed features like the “goal tracker” and “progress timeline” because these features had many issues. Most participants didn’t understand how goals differed from the courses, the goals were too subjective and personalized so the system couldn’t reasonably track the users’ progress, and the goal feature didn’t seem to address any user need or frustration from the user personas. So, I scraped the goal tracker. I also scraped the “progress timeline” because the courses already had written timelines, so there didn’t need to be a “progress timeline” feature.

The platform’s core features are the courses, the community forums, and the live stream lessons. The platform offers seven course categories; development, business, marketing, language, design, music & audio design, health & fitness, and personal development. The courses are aimed towards adult learners who want to learn a new skill for career development or personal reasons. This wireframe also shows the new filter system. Now, users can search for a course based on its rating, skill level, course duration, and topic. It was important that the platform was accommodating towards users’ schedule and skill level. Each individual course offers self-paced lessons, in which users follow alongside pre-recorded video lessons. Besides the courses, users can also use the community forums and live stream lessons to learn more about their chosen subjects.

The community forum is still a space where users can share their progress, ask questions, and give feedback to other people. The live stream lesson is a new addition for the platform. This feature is a space where users can participate in live stream lessons that are hosted by professional educators in the fields. This is features allow users to learn in a group social setting; users can chat with other users and be able to ask direct questions to the educator. All video lessons cover topics from the courses.

Most participants liked the new updates found in the high fidelity wireframes. They thought the platform looked visually appealing, easy to navigate, and they liked how the platform allows users to be independent or learn alongside other users. Academy Hive offers a lot of flexibly to account for the users’ unique learning preferences.

The high fidelity wireframes look over the homepage, course progress, badges, reflection, course section, community forums, and live stream feature.

Prototype

The prototype allows participants to create an account, search for a course, enroll, and view over the course’s content. I thought it was important to test out the major feature of the platform with the prototype test. Majority of participants had positive feedback on the prototype, they thought the navigation was simple and easy, and that platform wasn’t too text heavy. At the time, I didn’t have a lot of experience with Figma or developing prototypes, so this project helped gained a lot of new technical and design skills.

Prototype Test Link

Veiw Prototype Test

Conculsion

Academy Hive was created as a part of an online UX bootcamp course. I believe this project helped me understand the importance of research in the UX/UI field. It is essential to have an open mind while you are researching. You should never assume the solution. After all, the purpose of this project was to help people with their emotional needs while learning online.

My project changed over the course of its development, and its thanks to the people that I met during my time at Designlabs that I could develop this project.