Founded and led the design efforts for an Edtech company

COMPANY

Zaviga Technologies

COMPANY

3 Co-founders
3 Developer

DURATION

2017-19 (2 years)

The inspiration for the product stemmed from a desire to enhance the Indian education system, where there is a significant demand to provide affordable and high-quality education and to increase the literacy rate. 

With busy schedules and conflicting priorities, parents often struggle to keep track of their child's progress in school. On the other hand, schools have to deal with the challenge of managing student data efficiently and ensuring that parents are updated about their child's academic performance. To bridge this gap, our team developed a platform that brings parents and schools together, providing a comprehensive solution for effective communication and student data management. 

 Let me share our story of how we found a solution for this pressing issue and how our platform can revolutionize the way parents and schools interact.

The Approach

My design process started with defining the initial roadmap with the team, conducting user research, facilitating brainstorming sessions, designing information architecture, crafting user experience, website and also marketing material. Due to limited resources, I also assumed the role of project manager to ensure that the design-led effort was successful.

By having multiple design sessions involving the entire team, we were able to align our goals, gain valuable insights and work together to produce a successful outcome.

Competition Benchmarking

Through conducting secondary research and interviews, we acquired knowledge about the existing competitors in the market. This provided us with valuable insights into the common flows, features, and user behaviors when utilizing these apps. Although some of the apps were already established in Australia, none had yet been introduced to the Indian market. Therefore, it was crucial to determine how to adapt any relevant features to fit the context of the Indian market.

User Research

We conducted a qualitative research with a total of 10 users, consisting of both parents and teachers. Each user session lasted approximately 45 minutes. The user sample included education experts, teachers and parents from both India and Australia. As there was no direct competitor or product currently being used in the Indian market, an in-depth study was conducted to understand how the problem affected users' lives. Users fromAustralia shared insights into how they use the competitor apps.

The research aimed to gain a deeper understanding of user needs, behaviors, and experiences to inform the design and development of a new product or service.

Key Findings

• Two unique products were required - teachers app and parents app
  
• The main areas on concern were identified as communication, administration and planning
  
• Teachers were burdened with the repetitive tasks of entering details multiple times
  
• Modern day parents were inquisitive but searching in the dark due to confusion and lack of time
  
• School admins were trying to keep themselves informed but they weren't always successful
• The following were the user personas, which helped us structure our ideas:

Ideation & Initial Explorations

To ensure a seamless experience while integrating the three products, I visualized how the same scenario would play out on the parent, teacher, and admin devices, using sketches to fine-tune it.

With each version, we were able to flush out previous pain-points, and the app's visual hierarchy started taking shape. I made sure that each section didn't compete for attention and established a clear hierarchy.

Wireframes and User testing

Following the creation of a low fidelity model for the tablet, we began considering the information flow and navigation. To obtain unbiased feedback, we promptly prototyped and conducted a user study to evaluate our hypothesis.

The study was in-person with 5 users, including 4 teachers and 1 principal, to gather their opinions on the features. The session was open-ended and allowed the users to ask any questions related to the features. Additionally, we discussed the app idea with parents to gauge their feedback.

We also conducted internal and external interviews with parents, domain experts, educational consultants, and other stakeholders for each significant design shift. The individuals we spoke with depended on the feature being designed.

User Testing Feedback

• Only the premium schools were providing the teachers with Tablet/Phablet. The rest had desktop computer.
  
• Majority of the school problems were related to admin work. 
  
• The parents in India whom we spoke to, had not used something like and they were welcoming the idea.
  
• The onboarding was seen as a challenge from the school side.
  
• All the potential users had used apps like Facebook & WhatsApp.
  
• 4 out 5 parents whom we interviewed, were not willing to pay for the app.

V1 - The exploration started by designing the product for a tablet.

V2 - After receiving feedback and considering the technological capabilities, we opted to develop it as a responsive web application.

Design Language

Establishing the app style served as a fundamental basis for us to progress from the mid-fidelity to the high-fidelity prototype. A cool and calm color palette was deemed most suitable for branding purposes, and purple was selected as the primary brand color. We also chose a sans-serif typeface that complemented the rounded edges within our interface.

We hired a freelance graphic designer to create a logo that met our specifications.

Web app for School

Eduzapp helps schools to build amazing classroom communities by simply being the perfect teachers’ aide. This also helps implement, execute strategies and track progress in real-time.

Home

The home screen was designed to help the users easily upload the content and plan their day.

Attendance

We wanted to make attendance as easy as possible. Color coding to aid visual differentiation.

Assessment

Tests and evaluation made easy by automatic report generation and made it shareable.

Mobile app for Parents

Eduzapp helps parents by bridging the gap between them and teachers/school. The app helps in dispensing information at the correct juncture and in making lives easier.

Launch

The web app went live on the eduzapp.com domain. The mobile app was launched on both ios app store and the Google play store.

Reflections

While working on this ambition driven project, I learned about the social responsibility of a designer and how important is our role in something as big as education. Eduzapp focused on bringing parents and school together to support the student in all possible ways.

As we were planning to launch simultaneously in India and Australia, we missed to consider different cultural values and mindsets of parents. 

Looking back at this UX project now, I see how I have grown as a designer. This project provided an excellent opportunity for me to apply my skills in design thinking and the creative process.