Application design for

university campus

student communities

Tufts mobile is a free app that provides information for campus communities and anyone who wants to connect to Tufts University. Tufts mobile puts the university at your fingertips.

It includes:

  • Student profiles and directory

  • Access to health services and fitness center

  • Real time GPS tracking of Tufts shuttles and parking access

  • Location and directions on Tufts campuses

  • Dining services and mobile ordering

  • Official social media feeds

  • Access to university libraries

  • Alerts and closings- notifications

  • Student support, and sexual misconduct report

  • Sustainability initiatives

What was heard

“Busy and doesn’t work” “Overwhelming” “Layout feels very cluttered” “Too much at once”

Problem takeaways are:

  • Too much on the screen with no mapping or sectioning of the different applications

  • Requires users to look through every icon to find the application they want to use

  • The goal is to give a simple app for students to use to find the different services that the school offers, yet the app is needlessly unorganized and therefore makes it complicated to the find the actual services

  • Some pages are not utilized and their features are therefore somewhat ignored and unused

“I am an aspiring product engineer/ designer who enjoys problem-solving. I am detail-oriented and am interested in design & making things work properly”

Comparative Analysis- Learning from others

App Store Games

Rochester Institute of Technology Mobile App

Stanford Mobile App

Takeaways:

  • Takes a collection of different application icons and organizes them in a way that is easily navigable and effective. Looks and feels modern, and gives a much more updated and innovative impression to users

  • College students will be the main demographic of users, will be especially used to the Apple app-inspired UI design

  • Section on top for most used app features: The apps most likely used are on top. The user should have the choice to select what they most commonly use and find it easily every time

  • Grouping applications with short description allows users to quickly skim the different titles of groups to find the type of app that they want. Apps are organized and grouped together based on similar qualities

  • Showing cut off app icons tells users that there are more apps available to look at without using clutter inducing signifiers. Users don’t feel overwhelmed by the number of apps on the screen at once

Sketches

Prototyping and ideation

Design features incorporates Human Centered Design principles

The “Edit” button on the top right brings users to an intermediate screen that shows all the options and allows users to choose which 4 apps they want as their quick access tab.

The quick access icons use a slightly lighter grey color circle to indicate that these icons, unlike the other grouped icons, are not grouped by a similar quality of function.

Each group includes a prominent title along with a quick description of the group in a smaller text style to inform and not overwhelm the user.

Exhibits how the groups of 6 will initially be displayed with the icons in the third column being cut off by the right side of the screen implying to users that they must swipe left to see all options. This is intentional so the user does not miss these.

Skills: Design thinking, problem-solving, detail-oriented, creating presentations, Microsoft Office, Google Suite, user research, prototype, Figma, Adobe creative suite, model making, Scratch, Raspberry Pi, GoPiGo3, Python (entry level), JavaScript, C++, AutoCad, Adobe Firefly, DALL-E, Midjourney, Galileo, ChatGPT- prompt engineering

Accessible Design

Applications should be designed for all people by default. This means considering people who use assistive technology, remove barriers to access, and being mindful of everyone's ability to process information.

Ethical Design

Refers to design that resists manipulative patterns, respects data privacy, encourages co-design, and is accessible and human centered. An ethical application prioritizes transparency over agenda.

Sustainable Design

The web isn't green. An approach that focuses on reducing the negative impact of web technology. It aims to create a digital product or service that puts people and planet first in the design process.

Artificial Intelligence

A paradigm shift that transforms the way we perceive, interact with, and navigate the digital world. Promising a future of seamless user experiences, smart interactions, and more personalization.

Product design to

improve inclusion for 

neurodiversity

& learning challenges

In 2022, as a high school student, I signed up for an Engineering Design Lab summer program at Tufts University. I was part of a team of 4, where I became the mechanical lead. We built a prototype of an application that would help people affected by neuro-divergent abilities such as autism to be able to understand/decipher the emotions of people they interacted with. We also created a text reader that could convert text to a dyslexie font to aid people challenged with dyslexia and make our world more accessible.

75 million people in the world are on the autism spectrum and 780 million people have dyslexia.

The Tufts program exposed me to robotics and programming. The course was split into two parts. The first was spent learning the basics of Python coding, familiarizing ourselves with the Raspberry Pi, and learning to use tools such as a 3D printer and laser cutter. The second was spent working on a final collaborative project.