U Reach App
U Reach is an app to help students prepare for college admissions leveraging an artificial intelligence strategy. High school students and families often don’t have access to mentors and begin preparing for college admissions too late.
Role: UX Strategist & Designer
Methods: Competitive Analysis, Directed Storytelling, User Journey Map, Kano Analysis, Strategy Roadmap, Architectural Diagram, Wireframing, Interactive Prototyping
Tools: Adobe Express, Lucid Charts, Figma, Microsoft PowerPoint, Google Docs, Google Sheets, Google Survey
Deliverables: User Journey Map, Architectural Diagram, Prototypes, Client Presentation
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A student’s journey
“I didn’t know what college was or where to start because I was a first-generation college student.”
— College student
“We had a consultant help our oldest and that process was very smooth… It was very expensive so we decided not to pursue with our 2nd child but I really miss it.”
— Parent of a high school & college student
“[I want] more information on requirements or recommended things to have on your transcript.”
— High school student
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4 directed storytelling interviews were conducted with a high school student, college student, parent of a high school student, and a mentor. 9 survey participants included 2 high school students, 2 college students, and 5 parents.
When asked how students and parents felt about their experience of preparing for college admissions, they gave an average rating of 2.7 out of 5. Those who gave the highest rating had a mentor or parent guiding them.
Over half of the participants began preparing in 11th or 12th grade. Those who begin in 9th or 10th grade are less likely to miss critical steps or deadlines.
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Competitive analysis showed there are many resources and checklists to help students.
The US Department of Education provides a 28-page checklist that begins in elementary school.
But, most students don’t start that early.
There are many resources available to students, if they know where and when to look for them.
How do we help students?
Before they even know what they need to do!
There are over 250,000 high school students in Minnesota alone. How can we create a personal journey for each student? They don’t need another checklist!
Here’s a correct response to a question I asked Google Bard (an experimental LLM).
It’s possible to leverage artificial intelligence, specifically large language models (LLM’s) to achieve this.
AI strategy
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I want to introduce Kendall. She’s an 10th grade school student beginning her journey.
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She needs help preparing for college, so she signs up for U Reach. How can we use an LLM and help her before she even knows what she needs to do?
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Item descriptionThe answer lies in this magical black box.
Let’s unpack it for a moment. This box contains a vector database, embeddings, indices, and web crawlers.
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Using those tools, we can retrieve a prompt like, what date can a student take the ACT in their school.
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Send the prompt to the LLM, like I did with Google Bard.
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Receive an answer.
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Through more magic, we add a to do to Kendall’s semester checklist.
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And, send her a push notification.
A model for leveraging AI
U Reach prioritized features
Kano Analysis was completed on 9 different features. The following features should be prioritized based on feature ratings from 11 participants, which included high school students, college students, and parents.
Roadmap that guides students through the process of preparing to apply for college.
A Semester checklist so students know what they need to prioritize. Supported by push notifications.
The ability for students to customize their avatar. Star rewards for completing tasks.
Building a foundation
A student’s journey on U Reach app will depend on when they sign up and engage with U Reach.
Ideally, they want to sign up as soon as they think they might go to college. But, that might not always be possible.
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A student who signs up in 11th grade will have a different roadmap and semester checklist than a 10th grader. There is some basic information, or foundational information, each students needs.
The US Department of Education’s Checklist would feed the student’s foundational resources.
Moving the U Reach app forward
Roadmap for U Reach
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Build a proof of concept and test the feasibility of sending prompts to an LLM from a vector database.
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If that’s successful, build out and launch a minimum viable product with the key features outlined.
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Evaluating the app after launch will allow us to create and implement future features.
Future Concepts
The following concepts should be considered for future development based on their Kano Analysis feature rating, or their mention in interviews and surveys
Virtual mentor and chat, powered by AI.
Desktop dashboard, scholarship finder, and community connections (to Reddit, for example).