Structuring a User-Centered Website

The User Experience [UX] design team has been organizing various methods of user testing, specifically targeting more efficient ways of communicating content to our audience. Our strategy began with the user test, which involved having several volunteers tour through our 2011 site. From their feedback, as a team, we were able to map out pros and cons and make changes coming to the 2012 site, accordingly.

What Users Liked and Disliked About Our 2011 Site

Pros of the site included the overall design; its colors and pictures appealed to all of our test users. One thing we were surprised to learn is that many of the users preferred the footer to the main navigation. As far as cons go, many of the users stressed that the site needed better organization and clarification to understand the meaning and purpose behind the website. We also discovered that our language wasn’t well written, making it difficult for users to understand our links.

With this valuable user feedback, the UX team went straight to work on concept maps, site maps, user flow diagrams and detailed wireframes of each page to prepare the creation of a new, more user friendly website for Project C!

The development and UX teams working. Alisa Kessler, pictured far left, Jess Buse, center right, and Steph Rumph, far right.

According to our user feedback, we mapped out a user flow diagram to better understand the process our users experience when navigating through the site. Our goal was to create an easy, organized, and direct user flow with multiple options to reach your destination on the site.

Priorities for User Experience

Presenting the featured organizations was our main concern, followed by stressing the option to learn about them and provide the opportunity to vote, or learning how to get involved with that organization. We’ve also established the idea to share the stories of these organizations by focusing on social networking and bringing more traffic to the website to educate more individuals.

To wrap up the initial UX phase, we worked on several wireframe drafts. After our own team members presented their sketches and ideas, we began sketching out the overall idea on whiteboard with the design team.

From this first wireframe, the UX team built the first Photoshop wireframe, which was tweaked and edited a dozen times. In class, the entire team critiqued each wireframe draft for further improvement. At this point, the UX team is finalizing wireframes in-between design critiques to figure out what layouts work best on each page to prepare for the visual design and development phase!

We’re so excited to launch the 2012 Project C site, sharing our work with all of you! Your feedback is crucial and highly valued; if you would like to participate in our second round of user testing please email annette@clickingcreateschange.com.

Alisa Kessler // Steph Rumph // Jess Buse

User Experience Team | Project C

Team Building Exercise

Building A Better Team by Understanding Team Development

Another year, another goal, and another team to get the job done. Spring Quarter 2012 is underway, and this year’s version of Project C is shaping up to be a major leap for the fledgling effort. This year, the team members are all familiar with the project from last year, most actually having contributed to the previous project. But, with new goals this year, as well as new community organizations, comes new challenges; in order to acclimate all those involved this year, I facilitated a team development workshop at last Thursday’s meeting.

Teamwork is a make or break quality in today’s workplace. As such, we focus on leadership and building better teams at Ohio University. With my role as a Leadership Consultant with the Amanda J. Cunningham Leadership Center, I reach about 400 students every quarter with programming stemming from understanding one’s personal values to being a better global citizen. Understanding Team Development is one of our more popular programs, and it was a big hit with the Project C team.

The learning outcome for the workshop is to gain an understanding of the 5 stages of team development: forming, storming, norming, performing, and adjourning. By understanding these stages, a team member can then realize when a certain stage is taking place within the context of a real team experience, and act accordingly. We went through several activities to demonstrate real scenarios that put the theory into practice, and we had a lot of fun along the way.

This year's team successfully completes a "Birthday Lineup" challenge.

It is important to understand how to be a better team member when working on large-scale teams, such as the Project C team. We have 10 different teams (Design, UX, Animation, Development, Marketing, PR and 4 Production teams) all conjoining to create a joint-effort project, and things can get really hectic. But, after the awesome performance I saw out of everyone on Thursday, there is no doubt that we are going to be victorious at the launch of our highly anticipated project.

Thanks to everyone who participated, and if you are interested in learning more about leadership and leadership programming, visit http://www.ohio.edu/leadership for more resources.

Everyone Can Make a Difference. Learn What You Can Do!

As we begin the fourth week of spring quarter at Ohio University the Project C teams are working hard to bring you amazing, meaningful content in our 2012 edition! For those of you who may be unfamiliar with Project C, it is a student-run multimedia project that ultimately donates funds to local nonprofit organizations.

Students work together to create documentaries chronicling the activities of four local nonprofit organizations. Video documentaries, along with still photos, infographics, and feature articles are then presented on Project C’s website: www.clickingcreateschange.com.

With the click of a mouse, community members, as well as any other visitors to the site, can vote for their favorite organization. When users vote for an organization they are helping decide how to allocate funds to the featured nonprofits. This year, voting will take place from the time the site launches on Monday, May 28 until Friday, June 1.

Stay Connected with Project C

Join us in the social media spheres to keep up with all the latest happenings!

  Follow us on Twitter: @ProjectC_

  Like us on Facebook!

Get Involved

Just by telling your family and friends about Project C you’re making a difference in the Athens community! Project C strives to inform and inspire, and we couldn’t do that without the help of our supporters, and the ability each of you has to spread the word about our work, our mission, and the nonprofits in Athens, Ohio we feature and hope to raise funds to support.

Donate

Whether you can afford $1 or $1000, Project C and the organizations we are featuring this year will be forever grateful!

In 2011, Project C raised $1075 to assist the local nonprofits. This year we aim to raise more than $2000. Project C is reaching out to charitable individuals like you for financial support. Online donations can be submitted via IndieGoGo, a digital crowdfunding platform at www.IndieGoGo.com/clickingcreateschange. Online donations must be submitted by Monday, May 14, 2012 at 11:59 PM PT.

Help us give back to the wonderful and unique community that is Athens, Ohio.

Lauren Nolan

Public Relations Director | Project C

Announcing our 2012 Organizations

In January, we implemented a nomination process, where visitors to clickingcreateschange.com could nominate an Athens County nonprofit organization for our consideration. It was our goal to give community members input in the organization selection process. We had 1,185 individual nominations. From this list of organizations, we were able to choose the four who had the most nominations. The remainder of the organizations will remain on the nomination page for upcoming years and hopefully serve as a hub where people can look up organizations with whom they can volunteer.

This morning, we announced our chosen organizations for 2012 on Sandy Shirey's local radio show, Volunteer Action. Now, we're excited to announce (on our blog and website!) that we will be working with the following nonprofits to help tell their unique stories and spread their messages:

• Hocking-Athens Perry Community Action (HAPCAP)
• Rural Action Inc: Watershed Restoration
• The Gathering Place
• United Campus Ministry (UCM)
  
  

You can visit http://www.clickingcreateschange.com/announcement/ to see this announcement as well.

Our collaboration with these organizations will commence this week and continue through the end of May, so be sure to continue following our progress here on the blog over the next two months. 

-Annette

Co-Founder | Project C

Kicking Off Year Two

Project C 2012 is now in full swing. We are heading into our second year, and I am very excited about the things that will unfold throughout the next two months. A few weeks ago, Co-Founder Tony Guglielmi and I had the opportunity to talk with the former Director of Digital Content and Strategy at the National Film Board of Canada. He stressed the importance of documenting and sharing the process: the essence of any creative, multimedia-based, collaborative project. I look forward to sharing our process with you as our second year unfolds.

Team

We have gathered a talented group of creative minds that have the common passion of working for the good of others. Many of these people were an integral part in our first year, but I am excited to work with a variety of new faces as well. We have four production teams consisting of videographers, photographers, writers and graphic designers. We have a dedicated animation team, a savvy PR and marketing team, and a brand new event planning team. Finally, we have a collection of developers, UX designers, and visual designers to lead the web team.

Fundraising Goal

This year we have a goal of raising $2000, which would double our 2011 total. To encourage donating, we have set up an IndiGoGo Campaign that allows donors to contribute money online. We hope you take the time to donate as little as $1.00. Our online campaign runs until May 18, 2012.

In October, the Project C team received a Provost’s Undergraduate Research Fund (PURF) Grant to help offset the cost of our production. This grant will help cover costs of promotion and marketing materials, web hosting and event costs. Last year, many of these costs were out of pocket, and we are grateful to have a small production budget that will go a long way.

Awards

Over the summer and fall, Project C was privileged to have been a Finalist in Adobe's Design Achievement Awards Competition in the category of Browser Based Design. Tony Gugelimi was flown to Taipei, Taiwan for the awards ceremony in October, 2011. Finally, we took the Bronze Award in the College Photographer of the Year Competition in the category of Large Group Multimedia Project.

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Through this process, it's important to remember the purpose and drive behind this project. I believe that we are well on our way to achieving the mission of Project C: to inform, inspire, and call others to become more involved in their local community.

Annette Drapac

Co-Founder | Project C