Role
Product Designer
Duration
07/2024
Tools
Figma, Figjam
Overview
Don’t study alone, join the Hyve.
Studying can be isolating and staying motivated can be tough. Hyve changes that by connecting you with peers on the same academic paths and cultivating a collaborative environment.
“1 in 4 college students experience significant loneliness during their academic journey ”
Understanding the challenge
Many college students struggle with isolation and loneliness throughout their academic journey, often exacerbated by the pressures of their studies. Leading to no motivation, the inability to manage time, and a lack of effective collaboration with their peers. Not only is this harmful to their academic performance, but prevents them from experiencing college to the fullest. These issues highlight the need for solutions that foster connection and engagement among students.
Track progress and climb the ranks
Hyve's homepage offers a comprehensive overview of of your study progress and rankings, keeping users motivated with their real-time stats.
Easy-to-use planner
Hyve offers a streamlined digital planner to organize tasks, set deadlines, and monitor your study stats to stay on top of your academic goals.
Find your Study Buddy
Peer Connects allows you to effortlessly discover and connect with peers on a similar academic path, fostering collaboration and real-time interaction.
Personalized Study Hubs
Study Hubs allow you to joined curated study groups tailored to your courses, major, and interests, allowing you to joined collaborative learning environments.
Research
Gaining insights
I conducted a survey to students of SJSU to gain an understanding of their thoughts, routines, and struggles. This was followed by a set of interviews to gain a more depth and empathy for our users.
Notes and data from the survey and interviews
My research revealed several emerging patterns that shaped my approach and direction:
Adapting to various goals and workloads is crucial. Creating a seamless task management system will allow users to maintain momentum and regain focus, fostering resilience and productivity on their academic journey.
Motivating students to connect peers on a similar academic path will cultivate a community of resilience, collaboration, and perseverance.
From my findings, I concluded
Inconsistent motivation demands resilient, adaptable habits.
Recognizing this, I drew inspiration from Nir Eyal’s hook model, seeking ways to implement the principles of a habit-forming design.
This led me to consider:
How might we create an engaging study platform that assists staying motivated?
How might we create a platform that seamlessly integrates into students’ routines to foster effective study habits?
Hook Model
Internal: Academic pressure, loneliness, longing for peers on same academic path.External: Notifications of upcoming study sessions, new peer requests, prompts for daily study goals.Time spent creating study schedules, logging their tasks, meeting peers, creating spending time in study hubs, working to gain knowledge and increase rank. User gains points, earns badges, gains peers, climbs the ranks. Join/create study sessions, connect with peers, plan study sessions, track study progress. 
Organizing features based on the Impact Effort Matix
Visual representations of users’ efforts provide a powerful motivator enforcing users efforts and achievements.
Design
Creating a straight-forward experience
Sketches on Procreate
Organizing features based on the Impact Effort Matix
Early concept ui sketches, understanding the flows.
High-Fidelity Design
Prototypes
01
The homepage provide easy access to their study progress and rankings, keeping them on track of their academic goals. It also provides users with quick access to possible peers and study hubs.
02
Peer connect allows students to easily connect and discover peers on a similar academic path. With personalized recommendations and a simple interface, users can easily make connections and form study groups fostering a productive and collaborative environment.
03
The Planner provides students with a clear overview of their daily studies, task completion, and upcoming events/deadlines. Allowing them to easily manage workload, and stay on track.
04
Study hubs are dynamic spaces where users can join focused study sessions. Tailored to specific subjects, classes, and objectives, these hubs foster collaboration and provide an environment where students can enhance their understandings and excel acadmically.
Harnessing the Hyve
When crafting the visual design for Hyve, I took inspiration from its namesake, the hive. Featuring optimistic yellows, and friendly blues, Hyve is mean to evoke the warmth and camaraderie of a hive. Symbolizing both the productivity and support that Hyve aims to offer its users.
Visual Design
Future Steps
What’s Next?
Flesh out the rest of functionalities
I touched on the different issues, and their solutions, but it would be beneficial to fully design and test as a full fledged app.
Change the primary device
After going through the research and design process, it’s concluded that desktop is the ideal device for Hyve users. With these findings, it is crucial that a desktop version is created to better suit the user’s needs.
Design the Onboarding Process
Users may feel overwhelmed by the wide range of solutions that Hyve provides. The onboarding process will provide users with an opportunity to better understand the features and customize their profile to yield the best, most personalized feed.
