My Role
Product Designer
Tools and Skills
Figma, Figjam, UX Research, UX Design, Product Thinking, Prototyping
Project Duration
7 weeks (Fall 2024)
Overview
WellNU is a mobile application designed to simplify student support by centralizing Northwestern’s wellness resources into a simple and intuitive platform. This project was developed during my sophomore fall quarter as part of the Design Thinking and Doing course, a key component of the Segal Design Certificate. This case study is the culmination of my learnings from my project.
Seamlessly navigate resources.
Core Features
01: Problem
The process of finding the right support is burdening and time-consuming.
At a demanding academic institution like Northwestern, it often feels impossible to prioritize well-being amidst rigorous academic demands. Recognizing this tension, I wanted to gain a better understanding of how these challenges manifest in students’ daily lives when they seek help.
When students need support, they need to find it quickly — but the current layout of wellness resources online makes this a stressful and time-consuming process. Building up the courage to ask for help is already difficult; adding the burden of navigating scattered resources can deter students from seeking the care they need.
Navigating the current layout of resources on NUHelp
Problem Statement
When it comes to seeking support, students value clarity and timeliness, but often feel overwhelmed by cluttered, disorganized information and an unclear starting point.
02: Solution
A single platform for all resources.
WellNU is an always-accessible platform helping to direct students to the support they need.
USER RESEARCH
Discover.
In the discovery stage, I conducted primary and secondary research to gain a better understanding of how students were currently assessing mental health resources and handling work-life balance on campus. I wanted to understand my target users, competitors, and unmet student needs.
Research conducted at Northwestern shows that 60% of students are struggling, leading me to wonder how many people are seeking help, and how/if they are getting help. Since I was unable to find statistics on students using resources on campus, I was driven to talk to peers directly about their experiences with mental health resources at Northwestern. I wondered, specifically, why is there a disconnect between the availability of mental health resources and students' willingness or ability to use them?
Empathize.
I spoke to nine students to gather insights on mental health on campus. Given constraints of time in the course, I focused on ensuring that my sample was diverse in terms of year/class, background, major, and experiences with campus resources.
Define.
To align my research with my findings and help prepare the ideation process, I created an affinity map, user journey map, user persona, and narrowed my design challenge into a HMW statement:
How might we consolidate Northwestern’s wellness resources into a format that is intuitive, easily accessible, and designed to support students during moments of stress and need?
Synthesizing my findings, I identified opportunity to design a solution that simplifies access to resources and provides a more user-centric experience. After affinity mapping, I built empathy maps, then identifying some areas for opportunity based on the painpoints.
With these areas for opportunity and painpoints in mind, I drafted four core design principles: simplicity, accessible and timely, clarity, and interactive.
Design Principles.
Simplicity
Many students reported feeling stressed or confused by the complexity of navigating support options. They wanted a straightforward, no-frills approach to finding help. By simplifying the interface and minimizing unnecessary steps, I aimed to create an intuitive, user-friendly experience where students can easily understand and take the next step without feeling burdened by too much information or too many choices. This simplicity reduces cognitive load and makes the process of seeking help feel more approachable.
Accessible and Timely
Students expressed that when they face challenges, timely access to support is crucial. They often feel overwhelmed and may delay seeking help if resources feel out of reach or unavailable. To address this, I prioritized ensuring that resources are easily accessible, with clear pathways for students to find and connect with them quickly, reducing barriers to support and making the process more immediate and responsive.
Clarity
Students noted that a key challenge in seeking support was a lack in where to go, where to start, and what to do. In other words, students wanted clearer guidance in what steps to take.
Interactive
Students consistently emphasized throughout interviews that they consider other students’ experiences and opinions when choosing what support is right for them. Whether it be through word of mouth or even asking on apps like Fizz, students value their peers’ insight. I hypothesized that a feature allowing users to review and view other reviews of resources could help students feel less alone in their search for support and make the process more interactive.
Ideate.
To assist with ideation and brainstorming, I created more in-depth "HMW" statements to spark product ideas. Then, I narrowed down and prioritized features that solved the greatest amount of user needs.
Design.
Once I narrowed the features targeting the principal user needs, I drafted low-fidelity wireframes of the app screens to visualize the flow, key features, and gather feedback from users.
Given the time constraints and insights gathered from users' feedback, I refined the app's scope to focus on features that were both impactful and achievable within the project timeline:
The app is...
a tool to find resources faster
a starting point for students
a way to make mental health on campus feel more approachable and inclusive
The app is not…
a platform that dictates what students should use
a replacement for existing resources/services
a diagnostic or prescriptive tool
Prototype & Test.
Synthesizing Feedback and Iterating
In user testing, the iterative process proved to be quite tedious and time-consuming. I realized that what could seem so intuitive to me as the designer can just as easily turn out to be puzzling to a user, and thus prompted (many) changes in my design. I was thankful to have opted to mostly test with low-fidelity prototypes, allowing me to iterate as much as possible before really committing to design choices.
User testing proved crucial for the entire navigation of the app, evolving into a dock-style layout for the app. This decision helped simplify user interaction and made it easier for users to quickly access resources without feeling overwhelmed. It also informed me of what features users felt were most important to have. Initially, I had considered a "settings" category, following common app UI trends, but user testing revealed that it wasn’t necessary for the app, ensuring a more focused and efficient design.
Reflect.
Completing my first ever UX project!
This project and course was my first introduction into design thinking and product design. I stepped into the quarter with a preconceived idea of what design was— a somewhat narrow vision that focused primarily on aesthetics and visual appeal. Through my project however, it dawned on me how design is far more than a creative exercise; it’s a deeply empathetic, analytical journey in understanding and addressing real needs. Ultimately, I think that this was the most salient realization, leading me into pivoting aspirations of pursuing product design!
Let go of the designer ego and let the user lead!
Tossing away my perfectionism was a big challenge. When I tested with users, I realized that what felt intuitive to me as the designer didn’t always resonate the same way with them. I learned to embrace iteration and remain open to feedback to prioritize user needs. Each iteration demanded critique and feedback and a willingness to deconstruct and rebuild initial concepts.
If I had more time…
I would have loved the chance to turn more of my ideas into fully realized prototypes, as there were so many concepts I couldn’t bring to life during the design process. Ultimately, I had to narrow my project scope to stay on track for the course, but I’m eager to revisit these ideas in the future and explore how they might enhance user experiences. Balancing creativity with practical constraints was a valuable lesson in prioritization.
made with 💘 and ☕️