Unite is an innovative app designed to enhance the university experience for students. It is a comprehensive platform where students can effortlessly connect with peers, discover exciting campus clubs and events, and streamline their academic journey. From making friends with shared interests to navigating class schedules and staying updated on the latest trends, Unite aims to create a vibrant and supportive community within university campuses. The app prioritizes user preferences, ensuring a personalized experience and fostering meaningful connections while pushing for academic success. Unite is more than an app; it guides students in navigating university life without strife!
Research Process and Findings: For this project, I primarily relied on conducting interviews with five undergraduate students and secondary research on user preferences. For the interview, I wanted to understand user preferences, challenges, and even certain expectations students had regarding university life. I made sure to include a variety of different types of students, from those who commute to those who live on campus, as well as those considering transfer students and first-year students. Some of the questions include: How do you prefer to stay connected with other classmates and discover social events on campus? This question provided insight into how popular social media tools like Instagram, TikTok, and Reddit are used as a forum to connect with others. While others stated they rely on posters on the bulletin board and word-of-mouth, some people wanted a more centralized platform.
What are certain challenges you experience while trying to find friends or joining clubs on campus? There were various responses from conflict in time, lack of interest, or awareness about various clubs available on campus.
What features would you find most helpful in a mobile app designed for university students? Participants mentioned they would like personalized recommendations, event calendars, a chat forum, a map of the campus, and the ability to find other friends.
How do you currently manage your schedule for classes and keep track of the progress you made so far? Some participants relied on university counselors to track and manage their schedule while registering for class; others relied on the school registration web. One participant stated they liked using planners to stay organized and ahead of time.
What has your experience been like trying to make new friends on campus so far? Students who commute and work to school find it more challenging to make friends than students who live on campus and have more time.
As for the secondary research, I relied on academic articles such as Countryman, J., & Zinck, A. (2013). Building connections in the first-year undergraduate experience. The Canadian Journal for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning. (https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ1016560.pdf) This article explores how implementing music to support the transition of first-year students within the university can help them connect with others, build a learning community, and improve their efficiency and cognition. The findings helped me understand the importance of creating a place of belonging and providing emotional and academic support to foster a better learning community. The article influenced the app's development by showing me the importance of creating a supportive learning environment that encourages more independence.
- Firstly, it was very important for me to create a user-friendly interface considering research. I opted for a more straightforward design, which helped to enhance the overall UX; the app also prioritizes a more straightforward navigation structure with clear icons to help ensure users can quickly connect with others, discover events, and manage their schedules. Secondly, including personalized recommendations was crucial in helping students feel a sense of belonging in the app to foster connections and create a community with people who think more alike and are more similar; thus, the feed on the Home page can show the most relevant activities and posts to the user. Lastly, I incorporate three main elements, considering the article highlighted the importance of balancing social and academic aspects within a student's life, and the interviews further reinforce this idea that the app needs to have a seamless and easy feature for making friends and discovering campus classes and clubs.
Built With
- figma
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