EduQuest

Inspiration

The problem prompts originally stunned us - as we had all grown up in Singapore, we were not very familiar with the problems of international Singaporeans, nor those of new or returning Singaporeans. After conducting some interviews with international students studying in Singapore, as well as Singaporeans who went overseas for work, we discovered that one of the common pain points of our interviewees was acclimating to the fast-paced curriculum of Singapore's education system, especially after spending years overseas.

This struck a chord within us, as students ourselves; we were well familiar with the rigor and demanding nature of Singapore's education. However, hearing the stories of how difficult it had been for both our friend (who had spent a year overseas in primary school) and returning Singaporeans (who had to teach their children at home, to get them up to speed with their schools' curriculum) made us realise that there could definitely be more resources to aid this specific group in easing back to Singapore life. This is especially the case for younger children (i.e. primary school students), as the primary school curriculum in Singapore moves through the foundational level topics at a quick pace, and these younger students may face more difficulties in catching up.

In order to reach a wider audience, and make it easier for schools to liaise with parents and students, we decided to leverage on the existing Student Learning Space to create a separate and curated platform for returning Singaporeans and their children.

To further appeal to the students, we took a piece from the educational games we played and enjoyed in primary school, and introduced these educational resources in the form of simple games that overseas students can complete with a Singaporean buddy from their primary school, who can help them with any problems they face.

What it does

Upon enrolment in an MOE school, returning Singaporeans and their school-aged children will be granted excess to the Student Learning Space (SLS) and EduQuest accounts. They can begin using these accounts prior to starting school in Singapore, to ensure that they are well prepared by the time they start school. For students on Leave of Absence, they can use the site during their time abroad.

There is an alternate login on SLS for these students and their parents. Upon login, students can access their school's educational resources, as well as enter EduQuest, a fun, immersive gaming hub that encourages learning. In this hub, they can enter various educational games that can help catch them up to speed with Singapore's curriculum, as well as inspire confidence with reward systems and test their knowledge. Gamification is known to not just increase fun in classes, but also develop intrinsic motivation for learning, autonomy, and competency. These games support multiplayer options that promote cooperation and supports our buddy system concept.

The buddy system pairs the student with a current student in the school, who will be a future classmate. Buddy systems have been shown to be particularly useful for new students as they help them feel valued, supported and confident in a safe, inclusive environment. EduQuest supports a chatbox that allows students to communicate with their buddy at any time. This helps the student build strong interpersonal bonds and establish a support network early on, encouraging them to integrate into school life more seamlessly.

The parent portal allows for parents' access to their children's lesson materials in order to better aid them in their learning process. Parents can also conveniently contact teachers to address any queries and concerns they may have, while monitoring and accessing their children's progress. This parent-teacher helpline allows parents to gain personalised advice on how to guide their children, strengthening parent-child bonds and increasing the child's support in their learning journey. This helps them develop a positive attitude for learning that allows them to easier adjust to Singapore's more rigorous curriculum.

How we built it

We used a combination of Miro and Figma for brainstorming, analyzing the user journey, then creating our wireframe.

Challenges we ran into

Throughout the weekend, the time crunch to both identify an issue and create an feasible solution placed significant pressure on the whole team. The design process we were accustomed to had to be abbreviated and summarised in order to run through the multiple avenues of ideas and pain points we identified.

Furthermore, the lack of immediate contacts who had travelled overseas in recent months was significantly fewer than in previous years, pushing us to branch out beyond our immediate circles and current time period. In the process of tracking down and surveying the wide variety of people that come to Singapore, we encountered roadblocks in online forums and personnel we could reach out to.

Additionally, after deciding to pursue and look into the current education supplementary websites that the Ministry of Education runs, the website was down for maintenance for 8 hours. This left us to depend on online screenshots of outdated web pages for a duration of time.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

With the in-depth interviews that we were able to secure with both Singaporeans parents who resided overseas and children that lived overseas, we feel that pain points identified were a key pain point of these families faced with extended overseas stints. For all these families, integrating their children back into the fast paced, challenging lifestyle of Singaporean Education have always been a black cloud hanging over their heads. Since children are not always factored in as a key point of moving employees overseas and yet consist of one of the biggest headaches for parents looking to settle into a completely new country, we were satisfied that we directly addressed concerns of Singaporeans living overseas readying to return home.

What we learned

Through this project, we delved deep into the process of moving from one country to another, not just in terms of the administrative matters, but also its impact on the physical, mental and emotional health of the individuals or families involved. We gained deep insights into the joys and pitfalls of the expat lifestyle, and developed a keen understanding of the challenges facing children who get uprooted and transplanted into a whole new life. We learned to empathise with the struggles of individuals we may not necessarily relate to, and in doing so, develop a product that we believe can make the process of moving a joyful and carefree one for the most vulnerable involved - children.

What's next for EduQuest

We designed our prototype with primary school students in mind. It is possible that older students may have different motivating factors for learning (e.g. they may not benefit from gamification as much), and as such, the site offerings need to be better tailored for their tastes. In addition, we would like to make the virtual school a more immersive, visually appealing and exploratory experience, by including more detailed graphics and a larger campus. We would also love to design it such that it looked more physically similar to a typical singaporean school.. this will ensure expatriate children will get the opportunity to familiarise themselves with the local school structure.