Kappa Alpha Theta Life after Undergrad — A UX Case Study
“…a new city, a new job, new friends, new responsibilities. You are spread so thin those first few years and with that it creates anxiety.”
…That is how our users feel immediately after college. These women are barely making ends meet and when they are contacted by their greek life groups to donate money it causes annoyance and frustration.
Problem:
Our client, Kappa Alpha Theta reached out to us in order to solve the problem of low engagement from greek alumnae 1–3 years out of college. Soaring Kite Society began with the intentions of having young alumnae participate in activities and to give back to the organization. However, that was not the case. Posed with the current state of affairs our team went ahead to understand the problem.
Research:
After interviewing a total of 74 people through the use of surveys, focus groups and 1-on-1 interviews we began to synthesize our research for trends.
Trends:
Affinity mapping allowed us to group similar thoughts and ideas together as well as serve as a visual guide. The discovery phase led to finding common patterns around charitable giving, membership and engagement.
1.) Young women are not financially able to give back but are willing to give their time.
2.) Life changes dramatically after college and these women are occupied with finding a place to live, job hunting and overall adjusting to a new phase in life.
3.) Their fraternity does not do the best job of staying in touch with them and when they do hear from their organizations its generally for donations and that leads to frustration.
4.) They miss greek life that instilled a sense of community, leadership and structure.
5.) Alumnae need to understand the benefits of giving.
6.) Information is not clear on how to give back and how to network on online mediums.
7.) African American greek life has a lifetime commitment from their alumnae and are geared towards community outreach. Whereas their Greek counterparts are socially oriented during college years and engagement drops off drastically in the years to follow.
Comparative Analysis:
We moved forward with compiling secondary research by comparing other greek groups, foundations and companies. What we found was that all these entities had one thing in common; ongoing engagement. They had a structure in place that gave back to their members through community outreach and added value to their lives. So, when it was time for the participants to give back they were more than happy to do so.
As we dove deeper into the research we were constantly reminded by our underlying question of how could we help Kappa Alpha Theta engage the Soaring Kites Program with young alumnae? We had to propose a solution or solutions that would customize services to the specific life stages that these alumnae were facing.
Design Process:
We created a mood board to speak to us in Kappa Alpha Theta terms. To truly understand what these women represent we compiled images of what stood out to them the most.
Personas were used to show key patterns and needs for the college senior, recent college graduate and college alumnae that is 10 years post graduate. Journey maps for each specific persona allowed us to chart the paths of users and identify what is most important to them at their unique life stage.
However, we focused in on our target user the 1–3 year out alumnae, the young woman who has moved to a new city, started a new job and is searching for a community of women who can serve as mentors and help empower her. We had identified her unique pain points and now were ready to propose service and design-oriented solutions.
*Solution 1:
An interactive application that allows young alumnae to connect with their fraternity members wherever they may be.
*Solution 2:
Redesign of the current theta portal to meet the needs of young alumnae.
Solution 3:
Redesign website in terms of usability and clarity when it came to donations.
Solution 4:
Collaboration between foundation and alumnae relations to send out a cohesive message to alumnae.
Solution 5:
Offer life skills classes, networking with established alumnae and mentorship opportunities.
Design Studio:
We participated in Design Studio where each of us made sketches, pitched our ideas to one another, administered critiques and collaborated together.
Then moved along in the design process to paper prototype the application and reiterated our design after 2 usability tests. The current portal and website for donations was usability tested as well and we took suggestions into implementing our redesign. Then it was time to take our designs into Sketch to create a mid-fidelity prototype that was added to InVision for UI enhancements for a much higher fidelity.
Conclusion:
Our research solidified the overlying issue of lack of engagement from young alumnae. Alumnae felt as if Greek Life was something of their past. Now that they had entered a new chapter of their life that had demanding responsibilities Greek Life was not something on their immediate minds.
However, if programs were in place to allow the alumnae to network and to provide them educational workshops on life skills then their attitudes would drastically change in terms of giving back. Theta Connect and the portal redesign will allow these women to stay in touch, network by participating in events and reestablishing old friendships.
Kappa Alpha Theta’s investment in young alumnae success ensures that these women will give time and money to the foundation throughout their lifetime. We successfully proposed service and design solutions to jumpstart Soaring Kite engagement amongst young women and by allowing them to sense a feeling of community once again.
