Problem:
Sheridan’s Current International Application —
Sheridan is a major Canadian college spanning the GTA with 3 campuses, ¼ of which is made up of International Students. With that in mind, when students from all over the world go to apply to Sheridan this is what they’re presented with, a completely outdated, perplexing application process.
This is not the kind of first impression/experience Sheridan should be providing students/parents whose expenses are already going to be double the domestic cost(s), and might be a turned off/deciding factor when students are deciding where they want to apply.
How might we — create an application experience for International students that better represents Sheridan?
From a general analysis, there were basic issues like awkward form hierarchy, unstandardized naming conventions, etc. But in order to determine areas that needed extra attention, we spoke to several International students at Sheridan to learn about their experience coming to Sheridan as well as education agents who help students with the application process.
If you're interested in seeing that, click here.Based on our feedback, we created personas and context scenarios to represent the users of the portal, discussing their background, goals, dreams, the reason for choosing Sheridan, and their journey from applying and actually coming to Sheridan.
> Main Issues
From that, we were able to determine some common personal factors that affect the application experience for students, as well as common issues found throughout the process.
As for education agents, their biggest issue was being able to keep track of multiple student's application during the process.
Language Proficiency
For those who’s native language is not english, language is a huge roadblock, which is why many students look into getting an agent that will help them through the process.
Lack of Essential Information
There are lots of VITAL documents/requirements that prospective students need to provide which aren’t even mentioned in the application process at all (ie. study permit, ESL certificate, portfolio, etc.)
Lack of Resources
When students get stuck on something or have questions, their only option is to email the International office which takes several days to process.
Lack of Guidance
Missing deadlines is a common occurrence because there’s no way to track the progress besides through the emails they receive from the school, which isn’t very reassuring.
How might we — provide more clarity and help users throughout the application process to prevent comment issues & create less work for the International office?
Introducing: Application Dashboard
A major decision we decided to make was to add a secondary function to the application portal that would allow users to create an account and act almost like an “application checklist” students can use to manage and track their application process since the deeper into the process they go, the more information is required.
> Sitemap & User Flow
The most important thing we wanted to account for in our design was forgiveness, making sure to allow users to double check and go back to fix what they need, as well as providing extra help in areas they might need.
> Wireframes
With this being a very comprehensive process, we made it a point to sit down together and draw frame-by-frame, low-fi versions of our wireframes on a whiteboard for each part of the process. This allowed us to add/change things quickly and let us make sure we accounted for everything before moving onto hi-fi.
Below is just a few shots from the session.
> Style Guide
Along with our new application process, we created a material design outline unique to the International portal, making sure it abided by Sheridan’s brand guidelines.
Sheridan International Portal
Our modernized application portal aims to show how much Sheridan cares about it's applicant's experience and eliminate any confusion or complications along the way. Here is a walkthrough of the application portal experience from start to finish.
> Key Highlights
Here are some the key design decisions we decided to include in the portal to aid user's in the application experience.
> Application Checklist
The application checklist is ever applicant's one-stop place to find any updates or information they need to keep up with or be aware of throughout the process. It easily allows applicants to track their progress and keeps then informed.
> Agent Student Management Portal
The Agent's portal, though very similar to the student's, is slightly different, allowing Agent's to easily view where all their clients are in the process, as well as see what they still need to do in order to ensure a successful application.
> Final Thoughts
Considering this project was done 3 years ago and I’ve grown plenty since as a designer, I’m still pretty impressed by the work we did and the outcome of this project. We were told by our professor that all our work was submitted to the International office, and after looking at their new application portal, it seems like they could have taken some of our advice since they now have a whole
“application hub” like we had suggested, allowing students to make an account and providing them with all the information needed, so it’s nice to think we may have possibly made an impact with our project!
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