The Problem
Free, asynchronous online learning provides low-risk entry to advance your education. However, entryways do not equate to course completion.
My Solution
Simulate the feeling of an in-person learning experience for users through messaging and video chats to boost morale and accountability.
Who is there to help you?
Image you’re a 10th grader sitting in my World History Classroom. You did not understand my directions, and I’m across the room helping others.
Luckily, you look up to see Ruben with a highlighter in each hand, halfway through his paper. After asking him for help, you’re ready to complete today’s assignment!
But what if there were no Ruben? Or for that matter, a live teacher? Such can be the case in the world of online, asynchronous learning. While affordable and efficient, the benefits of in-person learning cannot be ignored.
This is where our team came in, consisting of myself, a second UX designer, and a UX researcher. Over the course of 3 weeks, we tackled the following goals of this conceptual project:
User goal: get responses to questions about course material and feedback on assignments
Business goal: help Coursera increase user retention and increase the number of students that complete their courses, with an emphasis on mobile development.
When it comes to online learning, Coursera leads the pack
My initial assumption was that users might struggle with course enrollment and overall navigation on a mobile device. I completed an onboarding process and assessed features of various competitors to determine potential drop-off points.
Coursera had the shortest onboarding experience of it competitors. Users can make an account and enroll in a course within 2 minutes.
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Their search and navigation features are highly robust. You can find courses based on a desired career, or the app will make recommendations to you based on your activity.
These insights should be no surprise. Coursera is an industry leader. They boast thousands of certificates and even advanced degree programs on their software, with over 100 million individual users across the world.
I determined that the current features Coursera offers, even on mobile, did not seem like a strong deterrent for the completion of their course. So, what is the problem? I turned to user interviews for answers.
People want to connect with people!
I interviewed 8 past and present Coursera users, asking questions like:
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Why did you start an online course?
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How did this compare to in-person learning experiences?
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Did you finish the course, and if not, what was the biggest barrier to success?
Here were some high-level findings:
The initial design for the community
The team began by discussing the potential components and user motivations for a community feature. I noticed that many community-building platforms included text messaging and calling features, which could set us apart from our competitors. I also considered mentors, which could be professors or professionals in the field.
After sketching, we developed our wireframes.
Lo-Fi Wireframes
My co-designer had a more simple approach, nesting actions after selecting whether you wanted to contact students and mentors.
My approach was the same idea, but it aesthetically modeled the existing Forums page on Coursera’s app. This layout gave you more actions upfront with explanations for what you could achieve. I also placed “Community” in the navigation bar.
I designed this screen for viewing message threads with classmates and to emphasize the automatic assignment of study groups with users who enrolled around the same time as you.
Users taught us that less is more
I tested our initial prototype asynchronously with 8 people and live over Zoom with 2 people to complete two tasks: message a new student, and schedule a video call with a mentor. Here were some key takeaways:
I decided that Community should live within the class itself, not the nav bar, since users might be taking more than one class. This decision was also supported by our test analytics, since users clicked the class before using the navigation.
Choose one place for Community.
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Other platforms (iOS, Slack, etc) have already solved how to message others. I decided to borrow their insights on page layout to avoid the high misclick rate we saw when composing a new message.
Model features using familiar platforms.
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Consolidate
We should not have multiple inboxes for students and mentors. Consolidate to one inbox to decrease confusion and low task completion times.
Increase Navigability
Implement a consistent header navigation bar on the Community page, include the Coursera logo as a home icon, and incorporate back buttons for seamless navigation.
Reimagining our features with a splash of color
I took the aforementioned feedback into account when developing our high fidelity prototype.
I grouped students and mentors together within the same action and wrote an explanation of community and its functions on each page.
The layout now stays consistent: each screen has the course title, school name, navigation bar, and icons. Users will know exactly where they are within the app and can exit any page.
The message inbox is now separated into different groups. You can also click user icons to block or report. The pencil to start a new message was moved down to mitigate the high misclick rate.
Things that we noticed and things to consider
Our final round of usability testing showed some phenomenal results. Our misclick rates for both tasks decreased, fewer users said that the tasks were challenging, and time to complete each task only increased by a few seconds, which is great considering all the things we built out for the hi-fi.
This brought our team into some final discussions on next steps. Here are a few to consider:
🧐 Wondering
🏃🏽♂️ Potential Action
How can this support our goal of motivating students? (Friendly competition and clear feedback)
Build an opt-in leaderboard for course completion and a progress tracker with “glows and grows” for submitted assignments.
Would we introduce communities right at the beginning of the course? Right before your first assignment?
Create an onboarding process for new community features, as well as deciding when this onboarding would occur
What features are free vs premium? Can the Coursera platform handle messaging and video calls?
Discuss the financial implications and technological constraints with the Coursera team.
Should the number of mentors be based on a course's popularity? Does the course creator of Coursera recruit them?
Decide on a recruitment system to obtain sufficient mentors for each course