Design is about creating experiences for people. When addressing complex socio-technical problems, designers pay special attention to account for diverse stakeholders and to envision how changes to the physical environment, social context, information, and technology can shape behavior. The goal for this final team-based assignment is to prototype changes to an existing mobility system and to effectively communicate the idea so that you can build support.
This final assignment will have three parts: 1) create a prototype and gather concrete evidence that informs key open questions, 2) create a video and poster to pitch your concept during the Final showcase on March 17, and 3) Create an online portfolio or a crowdfunding campaign to create an online presence for your concept.
1) Reflect on your feedback and next steps. First, you should meet as a team to read and reflect on your online feedback which should have happened as part of A6. Your team is allowed to keep going the same direction or pivot to another idea. You may also merge ideas into a single vision for how to improve mobility. Each team should try to check in with Prof. Dow during week 7-8 to discuss their problem and solution direction to make sure you're on good footing before moving forward.
2) Create and test a prototype. Building on your team reflection, create a prototype that will help your team gather data about the main critiques (biggest open questions) in your concept. Start by writing down one key question that you want to answer with your prototype. Then create a mockup, model, or an experience prototype that will help your team answer the key open question. This will be different for every team. Make the prototype as "real" as you can in order to get authentic feedback. Examples include:
Your goal here is to make a prototype that concretely illustrates how it could work. Ideally, this should be something people can actually try, not just provide an opinion. While this might not be possible in all cases, your team will learn more if people can experience some aspect of the overall solution.
For example, let's suppose your has a concept for the interior of a self-driving car. You should certainly create renderings of your vision and get people to react. But even better, you could transform an existing car interior and have people take a ride in your simulated AV. This gets closer to testing the experience than just showing a visual representation of the experience.
To test your prototype, you will first need to write down a list of activities/tasks you want someone to perform. Recruit at least 3 people (ideally these are diverse potential users of your system) to try your prototype and make sure to document their interactions and opinions. You may use a combination of observations, interviews, and surveys to collect evidence to help you answer your core question. Timeline: First draft of prototypes due on Feb 28th; testing/feedback due by March 6; final prototypes due on March 17 (final session).
3) Outline an implementation plan. Finally, take time as a team to reflect on the core critiques / open questions and be prepared to pivot your concept to help address these issues. Think about what it would take to actually implement the change you want to see. Begin by estimating start-up costs (and if applicable, projected income) for the next six months. Include expenses for peoples' time, as well as for resources such as materials, computing, advertising, etc. Create a budget and an implementation plan that would explain how you would take this proposed solution to the next level (e.g., to pilot the project, to produce an MVP, to build a fully-functional demo, etc.). The implementation plan should also explicitly say who you would need to target for funding (e.g., startup funders, civic leaders, directly from community members, etc.). Timeline: draft of budget and implementation plan due on March 5; final budget and plan should be included in the poster due March 17.
3) Create a poster, video, and portfolio to showcase your concept. Now it's time to refine your team's concept and produce a compelling pitch that will help you get real-world traction for your proposal. Your team will create three polished artifacts. A poster and a video will be presented on March 17th during the final showcase. The online portfolio will be used to advocate for the change you want to see. First to guide the visual direction for these materials, think about the vibe/mood that you want to create. Create moodboards and a style guide that specifies colors, fonts, and visual elements to be adopted by the poster, video and portfolio.
See these examples of good student projects that include posters, videos, and portfolios:
All deliverables will be graded at the end of the quarter after the Final Showcase on March 17th. The dates below reflect suggested interim deadlines for getting in-class feedback.
Your team will turn in these five deliverables by including a link to your team's Google folder with clearly marked sub-folders dedicated to each. All these materials must be in your team folder by March 17th, except for the video which should be in your team's folder by noon on March 16 (for logistic reasons). Your team folder can also include a sub folder with other materials or early drafts so that we can see evidence of your process.
Final Showcase: The Final Showcase will now be virtual via Zoom on March 17th from 11-2pm. We will create six Zoom calls that will happen in parallel from 12-1pm on March 17th. Please plan on virtually attending during that hour. Each of the six Zoom calls will be setup for three teams, one external reviewer and one TA/IA. This will give us about 15 people in each call. The TA/IA will facilitate the session, keep track of time, and broadcast their screen so that everyone in the Zoom can see the video, website, and poster. These artifacts will also be available directly through each team’s Google folder. Each of the three teams in each call will have ~20 minutes. This is the breakdown:
In addition to the virtual showcase where you will have a chance to get input from external experts and peers, the instructor team, include Prof Dow will provide written comments and a grade for each team. Please refer to this Google sheet with links to all team folders and the Zoom link. In the spirit of sharing, please make sure your team folder is well organized and "open to view" for anyone who has the link. Your three main artifacts (video, poster and webpage) should be in the top level of your team folder. All your process documentation, drafts, etc should be in sub folders. Please have all of your materials in your team folder by 11am on March 17th. Your video should be there by noon on March 16th so that Lu Sun can test the audio and visuals in time to fix issues if needed.
This assignment brings together a number of different aspects. We will grade these based on design process, communication quality, and the promise of the proposed solution. We will also account for team peer evaluations that each student must fill out by midnight on March 17th.