San Diego State University is a renowned institution providing university education since 1897.

As the Product Lead and Information Architect for this project, I conducted end-to-end research, design, and testing to overhaul the platform for ease of use, increasing usablity for both prospective & currently enrolled students.

^{Goals
Conduct content analysis, user-centric research, and testing to redesign and develop a new sitewide design for SDSU Global Campus.

Deliver designs and prototypes that serve as a proof-of-concept for our client’s vision.

Responsibilities
End-to-end research, user interviews, competitive analysis, user flow development, content strategy, design & prototyping, and testing.}

^{Timeline
5 Month Contract

Team
- Product Design Lead
- Front-End Developer

- Full Stack Developer}

Designs

Redesigned Home Page and Site Header

The new Global Campus homepage treats visitors as potential students looking to learn.

While the previous homepage is inundated with marketing material and news headlines, the redesigned homepage is focused on providing a launching point for students to find the material and pages they need.

Need to find a specific program or area of study? The reorganized header is better organized to fit visitor needs.

Not sure what kind of student you are? The What are you looking for? module funnels you to the right program, page, or resource.

Want to inquire about a specific program? The inquiry module gets your question in front of a real human.

New Program Page Format

A totally overhauled program page format affords a consistent browsing experience for students interested in a degree or certificate.

The previous program pages displayed large walls of text with inconsistent information on how to actually apply.

Our new program pages leverage a 3-tab system to toggle between Program Overview, Courses, and How to Apply.

A floating contact module on the right margin gives users an easy way to chat, call, or email Global Campus staff.

The program-specific inquiry module at the end of the page makes it easy to formally contact a professor or program manager.

Consolidated Search

The Global Campus platform has been classically burdened by a disjointed and separate search functionality, where Site Search, Courses Search, and Program Search all live on separate pages.

The new Global Campus search page consolidates these search types into an easy & filterable module.

Shopping Cart & Checkout Flow

Users now add courses to a shopping cart right on the Global Campus site, rather than using an outside vendor.

A consolidated checkout form brings a previously tedious 5-screen flow into one page.

New User Profile Functionality

Previously, all class registration and user profile information was managed on an outside platform, resulting in a disjointed experience between browsing Global Campus programs and managing enrolled curriculum.

Now we pull all user profile information into an all-in-one account that lives on Global Campus.

Overhauled Information Architecture and Content Strategy

A totally revamped site map organizes various pages and resources into better categories for browsing visitors.

Client Vision

^{SDSU Global Campus needs a usability overhaul to bring it in line with current competition and best practices. The platform features a wide range of program offerings, but is inconsistent in how it displays and provides access to those offerings, making it difficult to spark interest & convert prospective students.}

Project Requirements

My assignment was to conduct comprehensive UX Design & Strategy to develop new information architecture, content strategy, and functionality that bolsters usability of the Global Campus site.

Eventually, I delivered a full design specification, along with a live prototype, functional user flows, and sitemap.

Tasks

• Research platform shortcomings & industry competition

• Conduct User Interviews with past, current, and prospective students

• Hypothesize & validate major user pain points

• Iteratively develop prototypes alongside backend development

• Test

• Drupal 8 site migration & development

Research

Market Competitors

Our team identified and analyzed over a dozen key competing institutions around the country.

Our goal was to evaulate areas of opportunity, and recognize low-hanging fruit that we lack at SDSU Global Campus.

Some key features and content strategy we observed:

• Key ‘getting started’ links & resources
• Digestible search functionality with filters for programs and courses
• Home page tools that funnel the visitor based on the type of user they are.
• Persistant modules for contact, messaging, and help
• Consistent messaging heirarchy for pages and programs• User accounts and course management that live on the actual platform

User Interviews

With market research underway, I built a task plan and interviewed former, current, and prospective students to gain insights about the difficulties of lifelong learning and pain points of using the Global Campus platform.

I also interviewed Global Campus staff, program coordinators, content writers, and marketing teams to understand the challenges of managing the large myriad of offerings that Global Campus provides.

See the full User Interviews & Insights here

“I feel like I’m the forgotten child, (I) don’t have the resources that the other traditional students do”

“I don’t have a go-to place to check on my enrollments, I rely on links from program emails”

“It’s not clear whether I qualify to take a program, how do I even start applying anyway?”

5+

Topics Explored

11

Students Interviewed

20+

Staff Members Interviewed

10

Student Types Addressed

30+

Major Pain Points Identified

15+

Interview Hours

Student Interview Findings

• Finding program offerings is difficult, different Areas of Study are difficult to browse, hidden in menus, and are not easily accessed from main pages.

• Students don’t realize they have a go-to portal to track their certificate enrollments and upcoming courses. It lives outside the platform and is usually only accessed during course registration.

• Prospective students that visit program pages have trouble understanding first steps to enrolling in a certificate or applying for a degree

• It’s hard to preview specific courses and see key related details from any page on Global Campus

Staff Interview Findings

• It’s hard to gauge student interest on specific programs - some program managers are outside the organization, and outreach to those managers is hard to track.

• Global Campus help staff spend a majority of their time walking students through the application or course registration steps for various programs.

• Resource pages on Global Campus lack organization and defined parent sections, making new content and information difficult to coordinate.

• Pages for programs vary wildly in content structure in writing, and usually result in large walls of text.

Research Conclusions

Homepage needs to cater to users more, instead of mass marketing content, this page is an opportunity to help visitors understand the type of learner they could be at SDSU.

Users need clearer access to their Global Campus portal.

Visitors need opportunities to be to funneled to areas or programs of interest.
Prospective students need clearer directions for applying for programs or registering for courses.

Specific course details need to be directly accessible on Global Campus, especially when it comes to program pages.

Staff writers need a standardized messaging heirarchy to follow.

Header menus need restructing for better navigational clarity.

Global Campus is underutilizing inquiry forms as an easy way to generate and track prospective student interest.

The main Areas of Study page is cumbersome and needs an overhaul.