National Science Foundation Training Courses and Methods Mall Portal
A user centered design project combining generative and evaluative research and iteration among University of Florida anthropologists. We worked to determine and implement the best features for redevelopment of recruitment, application and administration processes for NSF methods training courses.
Quick Look
My role
I researched current courses, potential courses, and types of users with surveys and semi-structured interviews. I completed heuristic and competitor analyses of sites, created personas to define user needs, and helped build a new online portal. I tested prototypes for usability with prospective applicants and helped recruit additional course directors. After launch, I continued iterating solutions to problems and added quantitative metrics to our qualitative metrics.
Impact
My work 1) influenced the product roadmap, 2) convinced more program directors to participate by reducing their workload, 3) increased the number of applications, 4) reduced reviewer burden in collating and evaluating materials, and 5) reduced under-enrollment in courses with low conversion after acceptance rates by improving waitlist uptake.
Next steps
After the relaunch and restructuring, QualQuant served as an active methods training portal for 10+ courses funded by the NSF for several years until grant funding expired. Many UX industry experts received qualitative and quantitative training through the Methods Mall in general research design for social science and individual courses on Text Analysis, Cultural Domain Analysis, Statistics in Ethnographic Research and many more.
Project Overview
CHALLENGE
Onboard additional programs, create a streamlined application process and improve the user experience for applicants and training program managers of NSF’s advanced social science methods training courses.
PROCESS
The team worked to assess program administrators’, instructors’ and users’ needs to create and adapt content (generative), implement a centralized application and review process solution (evaluative), and use newly metrics to assess and iterative improvements (monitor).
IMPACT
Access to programs was improved, number of programs increased, applications increased, review time by program instructors was reduced, and waitlist uptake was increased.
WHAT DIDN’T WORK
QualQuant.org’s impact and reach remained limited by a lack of marketing, the short-term nature of grant funding for individual courses, and turnover in the Methods Mall team.
Planning
Methodology and Process
Mixed Methods Research and Tools
To understand both scale and correlation of factors impacting user experience (quantitative) as well as the coherence and user focus of our solutions (qualitative), we chose a mixed methods UX research design.
Qualitative Methods | Inductive Research | Constructivist Ontology | Interpretivist Epistemology
- Semi-structured needs assessment interviews via phone and email
- Qualitative competitive analysis and heuristic review of existing portal and similar sites
- Persona development and journey mapping to define needs of typical users based on results
Quantitative Methods | Deductive Research | Objectivist Ontology | Positivist Epistemology
- User surveys
- Quantitative analytics to assess site-based changes (Google Analytics, WordPress)
Solutions
Onboarding New Programs 
Unified Application
FAQ Sections to Reduce Applicant Burden 
Calls for Applications Publicized across Social Media
Impact and Results
The most important outcome of the work was the impact these training programs had on the hundreds of graduate students and working professionals who participated in them.
This includes numerous UX researchers at leading companies such as Google, Amazon, Facebook, and Microsoft among many more.
33%
More Training Programs Included
50%
Increase in Applicants
25%
Reduction in Instructor Review Time
25%
Increase in Waitlist Uptake
Next, you can check out some of my other projects or if you have any questions about the research process for this study, feel free to contact me and I would be happy to discuss it in more detail.