Stress Management & Survival in a Foreign Country
Main Function: Help new International students to acquire basic information and resources of their university fastly and conveniently.
Prototyping tool: Adobe XD
Icons: Adobe Illustration
Course: ARTGR 540 Design for Behavioral Change
Types of project: Group (Collaborator: Grace Lee)
1. Research & Statement
List of possible problems International Students are facing:
COVID-19/Health in general
Language Barriers
Cultural Differences
Food Cultures
Homesickness
Social Life
Poor Academic Achievement
Financial Challenges
Loneliness
Interface: Kiosk(main), App(sub)
Problem Statement:
As international students ourselves, we have observed and experienced numerous barriers and difficulties of being an international student both on and off-campus for the past few years. We assume many other international students that we have encountered and who have recently arrived on campus experience the same difficulties adjusting to the new culture and environment or simply surviving what is given to them. Our interface is designed to make newcomers feel comfortable and welcomed to the university and community and provide necessary support as needed.
According to our research, most international students face the same struggles when they are new. To name a few, the issues are family home problems, language barriers, poor academic relationships with instructors, relationships with other students, loneliness, financial challenges, insufficient resources to perform academic work, and culture shock (Oyeniyi, Bain, Furgerson).
Hypothesis:
We believe that our interface will give new international students a good impression of a new school they are about to start and provide confidence to be in a new environment. It will provide necessary support academically and daily.
Our interface mainly consists of 3 significant struggles that many international students commonly experience. Therefore, we understand that the struggles should be handled to have more pleasant experiences studying and living here in the United States.
1. Social Life & Stress Management
2. Language
3. Basic Information/Necessary Support
Each category will have subcategories to support and provide detailed help to the target audience. Since we have decided to design two different interfaces, which are app and kiosk, each one will have slightly different features due to varying levels of accessibility.
2. Logo Design
3. Kiosk Design
When international students first arrive in the US. They may have language barriers, they don't know any one, they don't know where to reach for help, or how to acquire information they need. If there is a kiosk with basic information about campus and the city placed at public places, students could easily access it, collect some information they need. It will help them to start their life at the new place easier.
Welcome Page: Say hello in different language, make students feel welcomed and create a geniality atmosphere.
Choose your language: New international students may be more comfortable to use their own langugae. Our kiosk will allow them to pock their languge, English option is default.
Chinese & Korean version
Select what you want: There are 8 categories for users to choose. These are information that mostly international students would want to acquire, when they first reach to school. I grouped them two by two with color. Two categories in each group are related to each other. For example, "Academic" related to language "study".
Contents for selected categories: At this point, users could see what contents do each category included. These choices, for example, self-study, group study and individual appointment, will fit for different personalities, and learning styles.
Users could continue click those choices to see what they are. Kiosk will only show basic information about these categories, users could access to further functions when they transfer somthing into the app.
Use the app to scan the QR code, then theese three categories selected by user will be transfered to the phone.
4. App Design
When everything is transferred to the app, users can access further functions.
5. Prototype
Prototype Links