Sampada Inamdar | Portfolio

PRODUCT DESIGN

MAR 2022 — SEP 2022

Digitizing Education Administration: Simplifying Clerical Tasks for Government Teachers

Collaborated With

Monsoonfish Studio, Pune

Samagra Governance, New Delhi

The team

Project Manager, Lead UX Designer, 3+ Visual Designers, 5+ Developers, Client Team (2+ Project Managers)

Role

Product Designer; Lead UX Designer

scope of work

Experience Strategy, UX Design, Visual Design

My Responsibilities

Stakeholder Engagement

Cross-Functional Collaboration

Ecosystem Mapping

UX Design & Architecture

Visual Design

Overview

Samagra, a mission-driven governance consulting firm, collaborated with Monsoonfish to develop an ed-tech system designed to streamline the clerical, administrative, and evaluative tasks of government teachers and mentors. In many cases, these teachers handle multiple subjects across various grades, often juggling additional responsibilities such as attendance management, parent-teacher communication, election duties, etc.

The goal of Samagra is to streamline these tasks through a modular system, enabling teachers to focus on building meaningful relationships with their students and maximizing the effectiveness of their teaching time. Currently in its development phase, the platform is being implemented in parts of North India. As an open-source solution, it is also being adopted by other states to enhance their educational governance using this structure.

Starting with ‘Who’

Understanding the users

The user research team conducted extensive field research, providing documentation that offered valuable insights into user behavior, needs, anxieties, and daily responsibilities. Based on this research, the user base was categorized into three primary groups:

Teachers: The primary users, consisting of government school teachers who often teach multiple subjects across various grades.

Mentors: Experienced teachers responsible for inspecting and evaluating the performance of other teachers in different schools.

Admins: District officials who oversee and manage the backend system to ensure smooth operations.

Teachers: The primary users, consisting of government school teachers who often teach multiple subjects across various grades.

Mentors: Experienced teachers responsible for inspecting and evaluating the performance of other teachers in different schools.

Admins: District officials who oversee and manage the backend system to ensure smooth operations.

Teachers: The primary users, consisting of government school teachers who often teach multiple subjects across various grades.

Mentors: Experienced teachers responsible for inspecting and evaluating the performance of other teachers in different schools.

Admins: District officials who oversee and manage the backend system to ensure smooth operations.

User Pain Points

Understanding the landscape

Mapping Features to Interfaces

Designing the information architecture and mapping the app's data points streamlined workflows and clarified task priorities for each user group. I ensured that all data points in the teacher’s app were seamlessly integrated and reflected in the admin's management screens and the mentor's modules.

Information Architecture

Structuring the interface

The product's structure featured modules with vastly different components, cards, input types, and interfaces. The challenge was to allow for this diversity while maintaining usability consistency and avoiding a cluttered or scattered experience.

Mobile Wireframes

Desktop Wireframes

Teacher’s App

Enabling easy management of time, classes & schedules

The app enables teachers to set and view their timetables alongside their class schedules, flagging potential clashes with school events. Teachers can also compare timetables for effortless rescheduling of classes or lessons.

Viewing Conflicts and Comparison of Schedules

Teacher’s Calendar

Teacher’s App

Exploring a range of lesson plans & assigning to classes

Through integration with DIKSHA, an open-source database for government schools, teachers can explore a curated range of lesson plans. These plans can be easily assigned to class periods, reducing the time and effort spent organizing teaching material by consolidating everything into a single platform.

Adding Lesson Plans to Class Periods

Teacher’s App

An intuitive & convenient messaging system for teachers

Parent-teacher communication, a typically time-intensive task, is simplified through customizable templates for absences, performance updates, and permissions. Messages are automatically generated based on a child’s data, and recipient lists are created accordingly. Communication is delivered seamlessly via SMS or WhatsApp.

Automatic Messages Sent to Parents

Sending Instant Messages to Parents

Scheduling Messages to Parents

ADMIN APP

Intuitive and Modular Backend Console

The admin app oversees data input and configuration for both the teacher’s and mentor’s apps. It manages district-wide data across all schools, including student records, teacher details, class schedules, groups, templates, and app settings.

Given the complexity of the system, we organized the backend into logical modules, ensuring that configurations were intuitive and simple for administrators accustomed to paper-based systems.

Attendance Settings

Calendar Configurations

Registry Settings

MENTOR APP

Holistic Documentation for Inspections

Mentors conduct monthly visits to assess the quality of education and administration in government schools. Their app supports the full inspection process with a minimal, straightforward design, emphasizing quick actions and easy access to key information.

While the structure parallels the teacher’s app, its design focuses on efficiency and clarity. Unlike the teacher’s app, which includes engaging features to encourage adoption, the mentor’s app prioritizes functionality and speed, catering to their professional needs.

Mentor’s Homepage - Visits - School Details

Details of Teachers Assigned to Mentor

Attendance and Assessment Reports

Mentor Logging a Visit

Reflections

Key-Takeaways & Learnings

The need for a modular system that could evolve as new requirements arose was a key takeaway. This project reinforced the value of designing flexible, scalable systems that can adapt to the varying needs of different regions and users, especially when working in diverse educational environments.

Working closely with educators, administrators, and other stakeholders highlighted the importance of collaboration in ensuring the platform meets both user and business needs. It reinforced that effective communication and feedback loops are essential for the success of any project, especially in the public sector.

What could be done differently?

It would have been beneficial to engage teachers in early-stage testing. This would have allowed us to gather more specific feedback and make necessary adjustments before the platform’s wider implementation.

Given the diversity of languages spoken across India, incorporating local languages at the design phase could have increased its accessibility and usability. This would have allowed teachers to interact with the system more comfortably.

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