CovAID
Spring 2021 | UI/UX Prototype | Figma | Complete
Embedded Files
User Interface Prototyping | User Research | Brand Identity
THE IDEA.
In early 2021, the planet was still recovering from the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic. Jobs had been lost, businesses had closed, and lives were forever altered in the process. The university and its personnel were not detached from these symptoms, as many students, staff, and faculty felt its ripples and repercussions. It became immediately clear to all of us that this was a changing world, and in order to persist, we needed to change with it.
CovAID was designed to help University of Texas students combat both the financial and logistical challenges experienced with obtaining a meal during the pandemic. The prototype was completed in a five week period between the months of January and February 2021, as the final assignment for my virtually instructed digital prototyping class. Through surveys, virtual interviews, and extensive background research, I was able to gather that there was an issue of food insecurity among students living in off-campus housing. In an attempt to address this, CovAID was proposed and designed.
The app functioned as both a free delivery and food service program for students, and a donation platform for students, staff, or faculty who had non-perishable food items they could donate.
THE PROCESS.
To begin this project, my class was tasked with designing a digital platform, service, or product, that would benefit members of the university in dealing with the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic. Step one of this phase centered around our understanding of the problems currently experienced by UT students. I spoke to students close to me, and combined this with secondary research gathered from parsing social media and online forums, to center on the issue of reliably sourced food and essential items. From my group's collective research it was clear that a subset of students who were subject to the disadvantages of the pandemic had issues obtaining food and essential items critical to life as a student, a result of both financial and logistic hurdles. After a quick brainstorming session, my group and I centered on a digital pantry service available to all students.
In order for the pantry to function self sufficiently, there needed to be an aspect of donation built into the platform, meaning the app had to offer two separate services:
The ability for students to log in, verify their association with the university, and select their preferred pantry bundle for pickup/delivery.
The ability for members of the community to see the current stock of supplies in need by students, and to create inventory and donate at nearby pantry centers.
In order to understand those distinct user experiences, two user journey maps were created for the processes, evaluating each major point relative to the positive or negative feelings experienced by the user.
After breaking down the user journeys for both donators and recipients, I created a simple app flow architecture to understand the pages and interactions that would need prototyping in the last phase of the project. During this process, I noticed that there wasn't a true incentive for the users donating to provide the pantry with goods, leaving a potential supply hole. Working against this, I proposed a theoretical partnership with a local grocer. Users would confirm their donation with a photo at a drop off location of their choice, and once that photo was verified they would receive a discount code to that shopping center. Local Texas supermarket chain H-E-B, a company with a history of charitable and philanthropic foundational work, seemed like the perfect group to work with for this process, so I made sure to note that inclusion in the flow and later prototype.
Once I created the site flow and page to page interactions, our group was able to begin the prototyping of the digital service. The prototyping was completed entirely in Figma, allowing quick and easy user testing and page interactions. We designed and created 56 different iPhone screens in order to show the full exchanges between the pages and different app functions. The project was completed solely as a prototype, yet we tried to fully realize the goals and interactions different users would have with not only the app itself, but with the university and the community that the service functions. This included the creation of an About page, complete with an interactive frequently asked questions screen and COVID-19 resource links.
THE PRODUCT.
Page updated
Google Sites
Report abuse