Utah Valley University Class Registration
Here or there you can register anywhere
Photo by Chad Madden on Unsplash
Duration: December 2020-October 2021
Platform: Android & iOS
Team/Role: UX Designer on an interdisciplinary team of 15
UVU taking Exceptional Experience a step further with mobile registration
Utah Valley University is located in Orem, Utah under the Wasatch Mountains.The 3 core values driving every decision at UVU are
1. Exceptional Care
2. Exceptional Accountablitlity
3. Exceptional Results
This commitment to these core values brought to light the need for an Exceptional Experience for students in the registration process, particularly from their mobile device.
Students feel uncomfortable registering for classes on the current mobile app, with little confidence that it worked
UVU is the largest public university in Utah serving over 40,900 students. The student population is diverse, consisting of high school concurrent enrollment students, traditional students, and non-traditional students
The current mobile app consists of WebView and linking out to the web. Students are not comfortable registering for classes on a mobile device. They have little to no confidence it worked when they tried, and most will find a desktop instead of trying to use mobile
Desired High-level Outcomes
1. Create exceptional experience for students to plan, register & view class schedule for current & upcoming semesters
2. Utilizing only their mobile device
3. From anywhere they have Wifi or data connection
My Role
I led the UX for UVU. I was brought on the project for my UX skills in December of 2020. I collaborated with a graphic designer and a developer on an entire app build. I was responsible for the design of the registration section. The project is ongoing.
Additionaly, I worked alongside, a researcher, 2 UX designers and 3 developers from a 3rd party contractor.
Our Journey
Revamping User Personas: Creating more accurate representations of the demographics
I was given access to the personas the previous teams utilized in creating the previous apps. I realized the previous personas were user stories of how the one user would utilize the system at different points in her time at UVU. Utilizing the data which had been previously collected and doing research on current trends for my chosen demographics I created new visual personas for a prospective student, a first-year traditional student and an upper-level non-traditional student. Our team was able to utilize these personas as we discussed how best to move the project forward.
1. Prospective Student -Traditional
2. First Year Student -Traditional
3. Upper Level Student - Non-Traditional
Identifying budget and time constraints to deliver fully operational student app in just nine months
We determined to start from scratch with the build of the new app. It had a massive requirements list which needed to be scaled to the limited budget. We were also constrained by the time frame; a fully operational app, allowing students to register for classes, view and pay on their accounts, complete assigned tasks, contact and set appointments with advisors as well as give the university a way to communicate information to students, within- 9 months.
Discovering challenges in previous app versions
Knowing the university was not happy with the 4 previous versions of the app. I chose to download and explored the previous version of the mobile app. I discovered the previous versions consisted of web views wrapped inside of the app. The text was hard to read, and it was difficult to actually accomplish any tasks on the mobile app. I hypothesized students would simply get frustrated and go to a desktop view to accomplish tasks like registration.
Testing wireframe prototype with students
The stakeholders gave us a short list of expected functionalities as well as expressing the desire for students to access the information currently found inside the desktop portal of my.uvu.edu. With this basic direction our UVU team started sketching out ideas and designed up a wireframe prototype in Adobe XD. We tested the feature sets with 4 different groups of students to see what they liked and what they thought was missing.
Student feedback included the desire to be able to gather courses together in a holding area to be submitted for registration as a group instead of only being able to register one class at a time. They wanted to be able to view the week layout of their schedule in a calendar view to check for conflicts and have a view of their current semester class schedule. Additionally, they wanted the process of getting into class off of the waitlist simplified.
We added these desired features into the wireframes just in time for the Solution Stream Team to join the project. Working with Solution Streams, we conducted User testing of the wireframes with 36 students. I was facilitator on 9 interviews and notetaker on 2.
These interviews were enlightening. There was lots of confusion around the cart feature and if they were actually registered for the class at the end.
“Was this added to a cart or am I actually registered for this? I like being able to check if I have a schedule that works with my work schedule before I register.”
- Michelle
“I’d like for the registration page to take me to a schedule page after I submit so I can see the final schedule and edit it if necessary” -Jorge
Iterating to balance student needs with university expectations
Moving forward we iterated trying to balance student desired functionality and the university expectations with developer limitations. I knew I wanted the students to be able to drop class or add classes from the waitlist in their class schedule view. As we worked to restructure the class cart feature to be less confusing, I had the idea to put the current schedule in the same area as registration, so students could go to one area to view, plan and register for classes.
The first iteration had students going to a landing page to select their semester, a remnant from the previous wireframes. The thought was to let students pick a semester and then they could view the current schedule register for new classes or plan classes for the semester.
The next iteration eliminated the landing page and instead utilized a semester drop down menu in the top navigation bar. Still utilizing the 3 tabs for navigating between schedule, registration, and planner. This will allow students to quickly move between semesters in a seamless view. Changing the class cart to a planner clarifies the purpose of this area of the cart and integrating the class schedule into the registration section allows students to easily confirm registration in a class.
Insights
UVU students are loving the new mobile app prototype! With features like seamless class registration and a user-friendly design, students can easily plan, register and view their schedules from anywhere with a connection
Students who have used the new prototype have said
“Wow I wish our mobile app worked this well.”-Lauren
“This is amazing. I could register from anywhere.”- Nic
“Very, Cool.”-Allan
The final results fulfill not just the university functionality requirements for the registration process, it also fulfills the students’ expectations for a modern app. The newly designed UVU mobile app utilizes clean familiar app features to give students control of their registration experience. They are able to securely plan, register and view their schedule all within the security of the app on their phone from anywhere they have a connection.
Thanks for reading! I’d love to hear your thoughts. Feedback and critiques are always welcome. Connect here or if you are interested in collaborating or just a brainstorming session reach out to me at TressaHopkinson@gmail.com!
All my Best,
- Tressa