I was fortunate to be accepted into the iSchool Information Management program’s core course in Design Methods with Professor Batya Friedman, widely known for pioneering work in the methodologies of value-sensitive design. My work in the class earned the grade of 4.0. More importantly, my project partner and I were gratified that iSchool administration adopted our report as part of a class project to inform their work of revising curriculum documentation and improving the processes we discussed.

Design Project: Improving Degree Planning Through Information Sharing

Curriculum information at the UW iSchool is maintained and consumed by different groups with different content, format, and timing needs. As a result, staff efforts to develop information do not result in updates to the sources on which students rely for registration decisions. This impedes students’ degree planning and ability to maximize the benefits of their education. To solve the problems inherent in the iSchool’s system of course information, my project partner and I proposed a substantial consolidation that would gather all information available to current students and the public into a single listing that users can filter based on criteria important to them.
Complete project report (.pdf, 587k) – Category: Information Use & Users – All Coursework

Artifacts to Embody Design Ideas

Within the design process, scenarios and personas are described as techniques for collecting disparate relevant facts into a cohesive representation of the design situation’s full context and the probable effects of the proposed design upon it. In doing so, they also markedly exclude other possible facts and elements from the design scope to keep them from distracting the process. Carroll (1999, p. 3053) states “The scenario concretely embodies a partial view of the design, and thereby exposes the design to critique.” Similarly, Pruitt & Grudin’s (2003) discussion emphasizes how personas stand as implicit critics of any design assumption or response, giving context for acceptance or rejection more relevant to a successful outcome than the designers’ preference.
Full text (as blog post) – Category: Information Use & Users – All Coursework