Researching the nonprofit webscape

‍Before starting the user research process, we conducted a direct and indirect competitor analysis to identify, evaluate, and analyze other non-profits. We evaluated their websites by drawing insights on user-friendliness, call-to-actions, and user flow features.
‍Completed competitor analysis that we conducted on direct and indirect competitors.
DIRECT COMPETITORS

‍The direct competitors that we looked at were non-profits whose missions were similar to that of Scholar CC. Of these direct competitors, we referenced BreakThroughMiami, CollegePossible, and ThriveScholars most frequently.


‍How is Scholar Career Coaching different?
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‍ScholarCC stands out with its tailored approach for English as a Second Language Students, First-Gen, and DACA students, allowing us to prioritize essential elements for a user-friendly website.

Features include:
• Simplified design for varied tech literacy
• Quick CTAs for mentees and mentors that are strategically placed in prominent locations throughout the website, ensuring they are easily noticeable and accessible to users
• Clear, easy-to-understand labels/verbiage to ensure accessibility for users with varying levels of English proficiency

USER INTERVIEWS

‍The objective of our user interviews was to gather insights and feedback from potential and current users who may interact with SCC’s (Scholar Career Coaching) current website. The interview aimed to identify pain points, attitudes, and opinions users have towards the website, as well as to understand how they interact with it and seek information. These insights helped inform design decisions behind creation of our information architecture, as well as our low-fidelity and high-fidelity designs.

10 people were interviewed in total, with 4 of them having a direct association with SCC.
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KEY INSIGHTS

Meet Our Target Users‍

Alexis is a 16 year-old sophomore with dreams of going to a four-year university after high school. However, as a First Gen student, she is unsure what the college application process is like and lacks support from those around her. Coming from a low-income family, her parents work late nights and she is often left alone to figure things out on her own. Though determined, she is seeking resources because her school doesn’t have the funds to offer strong support.

Maria is a 28-year-old graduate student pursuing her master's degree in education. Growing up as a first-gen immigrant herself, Maria understands the challenges ESL students face in navigating the education system. She’s always been passionate about helping others and believes that everyone deserves access to quality education and opportunities for success. Maria has experience volunteering with youth programs in her community and has seen firsthand the impact that mentorship and support can have on a student's academic and personal development.

With better understanding of our users and keeping their goals, needs, and paintpoints in mind, we began to design the site.‍

Information Architecture

‍From the User Interviews we commonly noticed users’ confusion in navigating information around the website. There were many overlapping navigations, frustrating users on which to click to find what they need. To combat this, we minimized the number of primary and secondary navigation menu items, and combined pages that delivered similar content to reduce the number of clicks.
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Original Site Map‍

New Site Map‍

Style Guide‍

Initial Designs

Final Designs