CHID Website

(Comparative History of Ideas)

Purpose

The Comparative History of Ideas (CHID) program at the University of Washington provides a flexible major that allows students to pursue their interests and curiosities.

How might we improve CHID's website in order to...

...increase awareness?

...clarify CHID's vision and mission?

...destigmatize CHID?

...showcase student work?

Immerse

Overview

As a group, we talked with the CHID outreach coordinator to understand the needs and wants of the program.

We also analyzed the current CHID website in order to pinpoint problem areas as well as successful features.

Previous version of the CHID homepage

Problem Areas

The layout of the homepage was disorganized and unappealing.

Photos do not effectively highlight student work.

The colors contrast and distract from the content.

Information is lost in the amount of content displayed.

Ideating

Overview

Using the hivemind methodology, the group pinpointed what was most important to include on the homepage of the website, and what should be included on the navigation bar.

We also looked at other department websites for inspiration.

Navigation bar ideation

Prototyping

Overview

As a website team, we pooled together the wireframes that we created individually.

Wireframe Mockups

Iterating

Overview

With the wireframes, we conducted heatmapping to decide on the most important features and designs for the homepage.

Then, as a website sub-team of three, we created a hi-fi prototype.

Heatmapping activity

Usability Testing

Hi-fidelity mockup

Overview

Our sub-team performed usability tests to discover flaws and successes, and note down likes and dislikes from users.

Following, the website sub-teams came back together to discuss findings and presented the two hi-fidelity prototypes and usability test findings to the group leader.

Michael Beach, the group leader, worked with the University technology team to pass along the prototypes and develop the new website.

Website team

Credit To

Leader: Michael Beach

Group Members: Sung-Duk Kang, Sruthi Dikkala, Fengdan Wu, Haimeng Gan, Theresa Tran, Mengjun Guo, Woody Gu, Michael Palomo, Ahlaam Ibraahim, Geoff Lloyd, Rio Faltys-Burr, Mary Hinsvark (italicized indicates the website team)

Website Sub-Team: Sruthi Dikkala, Michael Palomo, Theresa Tran