Innovating Online Learning Experience with MindEdge x METALS 2020
Hi, this is team SynchronizED!
The METALS Capstone
We are Team SynchronizED from Carnegie Mellon University, Master of Technology and Applied Learning Science program. The METALS Capstone project is a seven-month project that offers METALS students a chance to apply the techniques, theories, and methodologies they learn to real educational problems.
Our challenge
Who are we designing for?
There are many adult learners who want to go back to school to finish a degree, and most of them have a busy life — some have a full-time job and some need to take care of their families.
For these learners, flexibility is at the heart of their learning. However, some learners cannot afford to buy a personal computer or commute to the college to use the computer lab, which means, they lose the flexibility of studying.
What do we want to achieve?
Considering the inconvenience of studying, what if we design a mobile app for these learners to help them complete the course and get credits?
This design challenge came to us. We reframed the project goal and revised the hunt statement as below:
Through evaluating current for-credit products and identifying user needs in mobile learning, we will design a scalable mobile learning framework by leveraging learner-centered features, personalized techniques and mobile-friendly content strategies to improve Community College students’ learning success.
Who We Are?
Shujing is interested in exploring the world and embracing different cultures, which motivated her to pursue an undergraduate degree in Italian. Her background in social science helped her develop good interpersonal skills.
Shujing has two years of experience in teaching languages and music to students of different age groups. Her passion for education brought her to the METALS program. She is looking forward to understanding learners’ needs and designing effective and enjoyable learning experience through scientific research. She is a huge Disney fan.
Yu’s undergraduate degree in psychology allows her to use scientific methods to understand human cognitive and learning processes.
Before coming to CMU, she interned at Laix.Inc to design mobile language application for children, and a research lab at the University of Luxembourg to evaluate assessment for PISA. She is passionate about bridging learning science and user experience to bring successful projects.
Outside work, she loves Pixar movies, the Minions and Huskies.
Nabeeha is passionate about building platforms with interactions and innovative tech to meet industry needs and enhance learner experience.
Before METALS, Nabeeha was involved in the research industry as a front-end developer and UX lead with the purpose of aligning organizational needs with existing technology. Her final project was implementing educational initiatives to connect the upcoming generations of students with computer scientists and create a critical learning environment.
In her off time, she enjoys playing badminton and board games.
Congying Zhang completed her engineering degree in aircraft design in China. She loves solving problems through reasonable design with the image of the final user in her mind.
Congying likes the challenge of designing for people in different contexts. Enhancing the learning experience through interaction design is her interesting direction. She believes that good design will drive from the understanding of learners, critical thinking, and proper visual vocabulary.
She is a video game lover, a sports fan and a clarinet player in a symphony band.
Henry is all about building engaging learning products that attract and help a broad range of learners.
Coming from a computer engineering and production consulting industry background, Henry is looking forward to combining his technical skills and the learning science principles in the METALS program to reach learners that traditionally have difficulties in accessing high-quality education.
Aside from his love for the learning science field, he also enjoys making things from scratch, ranging from daily meals to video games.
Brand Design
Ideas behind logo design:
- The team name consists of the initials of the team members’ names: S is from Shujing, Y is from Yu, N is from Nabeeha, C is from Congying, H is from Henry, and ED is from education!
- Blue is our favorite color
- The paralleled cloud means the synchrony of the team members
- The sky and cloud implies the bright future of the project and our team members
- Also, the cloud looks like a ‘thumb up’ 👍
- ❌It doesn’t mean synchronous learning!
