About The Project
Richmond Ed Fund redesigned homepage with hero video
THE ASK
The Richmond Ed Fund is a non-profit, philanthropic organization that's goal is improving student learning and achievement in preparation for success in college, career, and community. The organization is looking to rebrand in order to continue their philanthropic support, attract new investors, and be competitive against other competing non-profits.
TEAM MEMBERS
Alicia Rydel (Experience Designer), Max King (Strategist), Walid Al-Tinawi (Experience Designer)
MY ROLE
UX Designer leading the website redesign for the Richmond Public Schools Education Foundation, art direction
RESPONSIBILITIES
Creating and iterating on logo designs, whiteboard and digital wireframing, low and high-fidelity prototyping, iterating on website designs, success models research, synthesizing feedback from client
TIMEFRAME
5 Weeks
Current Richmond Ed Fund Website
PROBLEM
Richmond Public Schools Education Foundation lacks tangible goals and success metrics to inspire the credibility needed to convince corporations to donate.
GOAL
To follow Richmond Public Schools Education Foundation’s evolution into that innovative venture fund aimed at fostering opportunity and equity to all students, the aim is to shift their messaging and branding to now focus on showcasing the real impact they have had, are having, and will have, both on school system, and on the community at large.
KEY INSIGHTS & RESEARCH
1
Risk
Corporations despise risk. So when looking to make donations, what they look for in organizations first and foremost is a credible track record of being both safe and impactful.
Target Persona
Our target persona is corporations or large organizations with both a history of donating and with possible ties to Richmond (i.e. Dominion, Lego, Amazon).
Whiteboard Wireframes
Drawing up whiteboard wireframes gave us the flexibility to iterate quickly and build the basic structure of how we wanted to build out Richmond Ed Fund’s new website. The goal of this stage of the ideation process was to showcase the organization’s hard statistic numbers, while maintaining an important information hierarchy.
Low-fidelity Mockup
To prepare for our check-in with the client, I created a low-fidelity mockup that closely followed the structure of the previously iterated whiteboard wireframes.
Client Meeting Notes
“There’s definitely a lack of goals and a definition of success. We need KPIs, otherwise what we’re asking for comes off as entitlement and doesn’t play well with the types of investments we need.” - Taikein Cooper
“I want the website redesign to seem approachable to everybody.” - Taikein Cooper
Inspiration Moodboard
Initial Website Iteration
Using inspiration from the above moodboard, I went about testing and playing with colors and patterns on the page: oranges for buttons for a strong call-to-action color, the primary colors used in the logo as card/chip colors as well as for the graphic images for the numbers section, and solid as well as patterned backgrounds and overlays for sense of playfulness and connectiveness.
Final Website Design
Iterating from the previous design, geometric patterns in the background were instead brought in as stylistic elements for photography. Instead of separating out the elements into individual shapes for patterning, I chose to combine the shapes into simple patterns, reflective of the main shapes and colors of the logo. Backgrounds became solid to clearly separate each section, or lightly patterned to add visual interest to a section of the page, the stark white backgrounds became off-white to give the eyes a bit of rest, and still graphics became moving gifs upon hovering.
Next Steps
1
Develop processes for gathering data & KPIs to showcase the organization’s impact
2
Digging deep in order to help find the stories that will connect with the organization’s audience
Reflections
Empathy and Perspective
Engaging with the mission and leader of the non-profit broadened my perspective on the social issues facing our school systems and what others are doing to support current students. I wanted to be mindful and really take into account the client’s perspective in order to bring about his vision for the redesign.
Real-World Application
Working on a project for a live client provided invaluable experience in applying theoretical knowledge to practical, real-world scenarios. I am grateful to the Richmond Ed Fund and Taikein Cooper for the chance to really put my skills and knowledge of experience design to the test and to come away as a better designer.
Value of Collaboration
I am thankful to the diligent work of my team for constantly moving forward with a high level of collaboration and work quality towards a common goal. This group really reinforced staying accountable, disciplined, and continually wanting to “up my game” to bring about the best possible outcome for this project.