Category: Education

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Ethical Design: Evaluating Digital and IRL Experiences (and how one might support or hinder the other)

During the Winter 2022 intercession, I took part in the Living Lab General Education Seminar which is described on its website as follows:

The seminar is designed to make General Education more visible in our classrooms and courses. We will build an engaging environment for learning through exploration, implementation, and assessment of a variety of proven teaching practices using Oral Communication, Quantitative Literacy, Reading, Writing as our focus this year.

Living Lab General Education Seminar

In this course we learned how to apply High Impact Educational Principles and strategies for Place-Based Learning to create rewarding learning experiences for our students and colleagues.

The culmination of the course was to create a new or redesigned course assignment or project targeting one of the General Education Learning Goals and to implement it during the Spring 2022 semester. A complete description of my activity is located in the L4: Living Lab Learning Library.

The Exercise 

In a Data for Good lecture at Columbia’s Data Science Institute, dana boyd of Data+Society told the audience that her proudest achievements are often when she convinces a client not to create something that can potentially do harm.  

When does it make sense to NOT make a digital version of something that would be better designed IRL? Are there activities that are more suited to online than IRL? Or are there cases where a combination of both are appropriate? 

In this exercise, I shared a few articles about online activities that have had an impact on real life. We discussed both positive and negative reviews of online activities, including Pokemon Go (The Guardian), which is often  discussed in terms of its getting gamers to be more social and active, to Instagram (Wall Street Journal), which has been shown to have a negative effect on the self-esteem of teenaged girls. A third example was on how social media use during the pandemic is exacerbating to the political polarization of America (Harvard Berkman Klein Center) by removing the public commons from physical space to largely anonymous forums. 

After discussing these articles, students formed breakout groups to find a news article about an online activity and discussed the pros and cons of that activity online. And to also discuss how that activity could be replaced by or combined with an “In Real Life” (IRL) activity to improve the experience. Finally, they posted a reflection on the exercise to the class Slack group. 

High Impact Learning

This activity focuses on three learning outcomes: Reading, Information Literacy and Ethical Thinking. Students are asked to read an assigned text describing Digital vs IRL spaces and then in select an example from the reading of a digital experience that might be better In Real Life or paired with an IRL experience. After discussing in groups, they then share back to the class what they discussed and finally post a reflection on course discussion board about their understanding of the pros and cons of digital vs IRL for the chosen scenario.  

To address Information Literacy, students must find one additional example of digital applications where the IRL experience takes precedence over digital. What might someone gain from a physical experience that they can’t get from digital? When might a digital application enhance the IRL experience?  

And to expand their understanding of who is impacted by their design decisions, they then work in groups to make a stakeholder map (Giordano et al, 2018) showing who is affected by the designed experience of their chosen example. Who is participating in the experience? Who else might be affected by the experience? Or harmed? Who might be left out?  

In addition to the reading, information literacy and ethical thinking student learning outcomes, students gain gain from two High Impact Education Practices: Place Based Learning and Collaborative Assignments.  

Place-Based Learning: Students consider the physical and embodied experiences of IRL versus digital experiences  

Collaborative Assignments: Students participate in discussion of the pros and cons of selected digital experiences 

Outcomes and Future Development

This activity was part of the Ethics and Accessibility lecture in Week 7 of the Spring 2022 semester. It took a little over a half hour to complete. There was no out-of-class time except if a student wishes to post their reflection after class. If we had more time (and were not otherwise online this week) we might have been able to go outside and play Pokemon Go or survey people about their online and offline political activity on campus grounds. We may still try to create an online/IRL activity during a later session and follow up with a stakeholder map, which we did not have time to do. 

The activity was low stakes and ungraded. The only preparation was to find three articles to discuss as examples of Online activities that either replace or compromise IRL experiences. Because this assignment is ungraded, I plan to use it as part of the participation grade. I do not believe my course is part of the college-wide general education assessment initiative. It is an elective. 

Students enjoyed discussing online versus “In Real Life” very much. They are very aware of online activities that are creating unrealistic expectations for their real-life relationships and are concerned about exacerbating these experiences through their design careers. I would like to refine the activity and possibly replace a duller accessibility study that they do for credit and that could be done in class in groups or as a demonstration. Not being able to go outside or actually be IRL was an issue with this activity, though some students mentioned that it made it easier for everyone in their group to search for articles since they were all sitting at a computer anyway. 

Resources and Reflections 

My activity presentation for the Living Lab course is openly available at https://cuny907-my.sharepoint.com/:p:/g/personal/noreen_whysel27_login_cuny_edu/EeDP7sDKTAROh1Nle8uKlagB5bMXEem7EM4k6Lvh7nagBA?e=FgnQIx 

You can also read about this and other OER activities on the course blog at https://openlab.citytech.cuny.edu/l4/2022/03/28/ethical-design-evaluating-digital-and-irl-experiences-and-how-one-might-support-or-hinder-the-other/

The Slack channel where students posted their reflections is a private discussion space for students of the HE93 section of COMD3562. I will post an image with student names anonymized to show an example of the written output from this assignment. Students who wish to post their reflections publicly will be able to reply to the post on Open Lab. 

This article was originally posted on March 28, 2022 on CUNY Open Lab.

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The Occasional Mentor: Kill Your Darlings

Photo by Steve Johnson on Unsplash

THE OCCASIONAL MENTOR is a semi-regular column based on questions I’ve answered on Quora, heard on Slack groups, and other career advice I’ve given over the prior month. Feel free to challenge me in the comments, if you have a different experience.

Kill Your Darlings

I am working on a project with a friend who is acting as a client for a capstone project with an agile development class. She complained to me that the students were unable to create a simple one-sheet deliverable featuring a proposed design. The problem: WordPress hasn’t been set up yet. It didn’t occur to them that they could mock it up in a drawing program or simply sketch it by hand.

When I do in-class studios, I will often make the design students work entirely on paper and whiteboard, no computers allowed, to ideate and create a paper prototype. It can be done in two hours end to end. Is the final deliverable App Store ready? Of course not. But it is enough to move quite a bit toward a testable idea.

Students today, and especially developers, don’t understand the power of a piece of paper that you can throw away. When you start coding (or drafting in WordPress) too soon, you get too married to the code, making it hard later on to incorporate new learnings from your user research. It’s better practice to stay as low fi as possible for as long as possible. That’s at least one day of a five day sprint. Sometimes two (testing the paper artifacts with users). Then “Kill your darlings” before they become too dear.

Note: The phrase “Kill your darlings” (or “murder your babies”) is often attributed to William Faulkner and is a feature of many descriptions of the Beat poets: William Borroughs, Allan Ginsberg, Jack Kerouac et al. In fact, the concept “murder your babies” can be traced to Sir Arthur Quiller-Couch, a British writer and literary critic in a 1916 lecture series at Cambridge. (Quiller-Couch, Sir Arthur (2000) [1916]. “XII. On Style”. On the Art of Writing: Lectures Delivered in the University of Cambridge, 1913–1914 (Online ed.). Bartleby.com.)

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Downward Dot Voting

My friend Austin Govella wrote today on using a kind of whole-body dot voting to teach teams to “Vote With Your Feet“. We are in a Liminal Thinking group on Facebook where he initially threw his ideas around. I was excited that he chose to add my comment about using negative dots to vote down ideas, and use them in my undergraduate UX class as a discussion point about what we Won’t do or talk about on a project.

My students get to use dot voting on the first day of our UX/UI class at CUNY CityTech, where we talk about what we are worried about for the upcoming semester. Addressing concerns and potential problems is a good exercise in most occasions, but in these days of online classes, crushing economy and pandemic, talking about our worries is particularly important. It helps to alleviate anxiety and develop a growth mindset toward the months ahead.

In this first class, the students learn about a number of design practices using a shared, online whiteboard, including brainstorming, dot voting, cluster analysis, and Kanban as part of a pre-mortem exercise on what can go wrong with the class. (I learned this exercise while teaching with Jimmy Chandler at the New York Code and Design Academy and modified it for online classes).

To begin, students use virtual sticky notes to write down their concerns about the coming semester. Then the students attach green and red mini circles, three each, to vote on which issues they want to discuss and which ones they don’t. Then we use Kanban (To do, Doing, Done) to keep the discussion orderly.

When I used the technique earlier on, I allowed each student three dots to vote on ideas that they want to discuss. There are usually concerns expressed that are common students commuting to our downtown Brooklyn campus, like getting to class on time (what if the subway breaks down? what if my work goes overtime?), having too much homework (it is a lot of homework, tbh), or dealing with a teammate that doesn’t pull their share (this happens on the job, too, unfortunately). It was OK. But these concerns, being fairly common are covered in the syllabus in the items about time management, group behavior and attendance, so the discussion becomes somewhat procedural.

There are of course new and now-common issues this semester about logging into school instead of commuting, managing family and job expectations, particularly for those students whose families rely on their job income and dealing with the combined stress of school, real and potential loss of family members (at least two of my students had a COVID death in the family and many have been displaced or ill), and just living in the 2020 political and budgetary climate. These issues are very personal and went largely unspoken but manifested as concerns about deadlines, time management and doubts that they have the skills it takes to be successful.

By allowing the students to select some issues that are not particularly a concern was a new idea and I found it especially interesting to explore them with the class. So along with items that have a lot of upvotes, I also selected items that have some upvotes, but also a few downvotes (more than one downvote, so as not to put any one person on the spot).

“Not a Concern” is key phrasing. For the upvote dots, I told the students to “mark items they want to talk about.” For downvote dots, the instructions are “mark items that are Not a Concern.” Te fact that someone wrote the issue on a sticky note in the first place means it is a concern for some students. I inferred from the “Not a Concern” votes that maybe there are people who have discovered ways to deal with the problem.

And for a teacher, it highlights differences in each class (there are always differences) that point to certain pedagogical approaches. For instance in one section the most up-voted concern was “potential weakness in design skills.” In the other section, a similar issue got a lot of down-votes. I wanted to know what was going on so made sure to expand on that concern in the second week’s discussion and begin a discussion of skills development, the importance of practice, and imposter syndrome.

This then becomes an opportunity for a discussion of growth. I tell them to ask themselves, How can I, as a student in a rigorous BFA program, discover ways to develop perspective so I understand where the doubt is coming from? How can I build confidence? Through practice, time management and simply being honest about the particularly stressful challenges this world is throwing at us and asking for help.

So cheers to Austin for giving me a fun topic to explore here. While you are at it, you can find his book, Collaborative Product Design at https://www.agux.co/cpd.

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The Occasional Mentor: Career Advice — College Degrees and the Long, Post-Interview Wait

I answer questions about Careers, Mentorship and other topics on Quora. A selection of these answers will be reposted on Medium with occasional, minor editing for clarity. Following are selected questions I answered in October.

Are you going to be an unsuccessful person without a college degree?

Answered October 13, 2017

It depends, of course, on what success means to you. A lot of successful actors and artists don’t have degrees. All successful doctors and lawyers do. And while you can be quite successful as a plumber or electrician without a degree, the overwhelming majority of business leaders have one. The reason people keep trotting out the degree-less Zuckerberg, Jobs and Gates is because – try to name one more. It’s not that easy. And by the way, did you drop out of Harvard?

You may be tremendously rich and successful without a college degree, but if so you would also be very rare. A college degree will get you ahead faster in most professions that require it or some level of certification. With a degree, you qualify for any job that does or doesn’t require one, but without it you won’t qualify for any of the jobs that do, so you are limiting your options. Without a degree you will be competing not just for jobs but also for promotions or for clients. You will need to fight to stand out and suffer not even getting the call because it’s an easy way to narrow down a long list of applicants.

Not all jobs require degrees. I’ve seen many government jobs that require a masters degree that will accept a certain number of years of experience along with a lesser degree, say a BA with 5 years of experience, or no degree but ten years of supervisory experience. You would need to calculate the cost of the degree and potentially lost wages over 5–6 years of studying against starting at a lower salary class and working many more years to qualify.

It is true that in some fields, particularly trades, where a degree not required, having one may actually hold you back. In this case, your competition for jobs has already spent four years perfecting his craft while you were in school. It is also true that the significant level of student loan debt you may accumulate can hold back your financial future, especially if you end up in a job that doesn’t pay well or didn’t require a degree in the first place, or if you struggle (either to pay tuition or academically) and fail to graduate.

I went for a job interview over a week ago and have not heard anything. I forgot to ask what their timeline for the job was. Does this mean I probably didn’t get the job?

Answered October 3, 2017

A week or even a week and a half is the perfect time to call or email to follow up, ask about your standing, offer an update on anything you may have discussed that was in progress during the interview or to forward some interesting article or news that is relevant to the work.

Getting beyond two or three weeks is somewhat long but I would still follow up in the same tone as if it had only been a week. As others have said, sometime the process does take long depending on the number of applicants or uniqueness of the role.

Beyond a month or two, they may have passed on you because it seems that you have passed on them. But there still could be a chance at that point that they haven’t settled on a hire or have changed the need or requirements somewhat. At that point I would make a simple request for a decision, i.e., has one been made, so I can get feedback and move on.

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The Best User Experience Education Programs in NYC

I answer questions about UX, Information Architecture and other topics on Quora. A selection of these answers will be reposted on Medium with occasional, minor editing for clarity.

What are the best User Experience education programs based in New York? Are there any college accredited programs?

NYU has a degree in its Interactive Telecommunications Program (ITP) which I believe is one of the oldest, if not the oldest, Masters program in the field.

School of Visual Arts has a highly regarded MFA program in Interaction Design. The founder Liz Danzico is now head of UX at NPR.

Pratt School of Information just started offering a masters in Information Experience Design (M.S.). I took the courses for a UX concentration for my MSLIS degree before the program was formalized in 2015. The teaching staff is quite good, with many industry leaders in adjunct roles. Pratt also offers a design BFA and MFA that includes UX.

Parsons School of Design at the New School offers undergraduate and graduate programs that cover UX but are along more traditional disciplines (communications design, product design, industrial design, design and technology, transdisciplinary design). The idea is that UX is necessary within all these areas.

There are several professional programs that offer Certificate/boot camp courses. Recruiters are mixed on the value of the programs, but they are good continuing education options or for transferring into the field. They are not highly regarded as a replacement for a BA, though could be an alternative to a Masters degree.

An alternative might be to enter into a traditional Library and Information Science program. There are a few accredited LIS programs in the NYC area, including Pratt Institute, Queens College, St. Johns University and Long Island University in New York City and Rutgers University in New Brunswick, New Jersey. These programs teach the fundamentals of knowledge organization, information seeking behavior, taxonomic theory and related technologies, and have a growing interest in providing courses in user experience topics.

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Wikipedia at IA Summit 2016

As a Wikipedian who has been increasingly involved with editathons in New York City since completing my MLIS degree at Pratt Institute School of Information, I have been interested in creating bridges between the Wikipedia and IA communities. Thanks to a Wikimedia Foundation TPS grant, I was able to represent Wikipedia at the 2016 IA Summit in Atlanta and at the IA Institute’s workshop on Architecting the Information of Georgia House Bill 757, hosted by the Center for Civil and Human Rights.

I am especially interested in the linked data capabilities of Wikipedia and Wikidata as it is a growing topic among Information Architects and increasingly affecting how digital environments are structured and built. Last year, I created WikiProject: Information Architecture to pique interest among the IA community in Wikipedia editing, with the ultimate goal of showing IAs how their knowledge and expertise contributes to engaging Wikipedia users. I also presented a session on IA and Wikipedia at the 2015 Information Architecture Summit in Minneapolis and wrote an article on IA in Wikipedia for the ASIS&T Bulletin, which increased interest in potential editing and collaboration with the Wikipedia community. While I was originally interested in getting more IAs involved to develop Information Architecture topics in Wikipedia, it is becoming increasingly clear that the IA community is equipped to collaborate with Wikipedia on its own technology development and projects.

This year’s IA Summit was a continued exploration of the relationship between the Wikipedia and IA communities at the 2016 IA Summit in Atlanta. On Saturday May 7, I represented Wikipedia at two events, a workshop hosted by the Information Architecture Institute at the Center for Civil and Human Rights in Atlanta, and IA Summit Game Night which took place the same evening at the Omni Atlanta Hotel. The workshop, “Architecting the Information of Georgia House Bill 757” was the Institute’s response to the proposal of a bill that would potentially discriminate against the LGBT community. About 30 IAI members attended. The format was primarily discussion and centered on the role and impact of language in legislative processes. My input centered on Wikipedia as an information architecture tool that describes and related concepts internationally through its articles and Wikidata. I proposed that the IA Institute and its members should take a greater role in editing and offer their expertise in the structure of information to the Wikipedia community. I further made an appeal for information architects to take greater ownership of the structure of language and concept relationships as defined in Wikidata and its tools and APIs.

IA Summit Game Night, held immediately after the IAI workshop at the Omni Atlanta Hotel, hosted 85 attendees. Players selected from ten tables, one which was dedicated to Wikipedia. We set up the unofficial Wikipedia game and also used it as a way to introduce information architect practitioners to Wikipedia editing. The evening went from 8-11pm and we played several rounds of the game. Most of the people who stopped by the table who inquired about my role with Wikipedia turned out to already be editors, but mostly on a very casual level. I encouraged them to continue to edit and discussed the structure of Wikidata as a tool that IAs can use in developing information spaces outside of Wikipedia.

Wikipedia Gamers at IA Summit 2016 Game Night
Wikipedia Gamers at IA Summit 2016 Game Night

Wikipedia Swag at IA Summit 2016 Game Night
Wikipedia Swag at IA Summit 2016 Game Night

Game night was a lot of fun and opened a conversation about the ways that IAs can participate in local Wikipedia activities in their areas as well as generally as editors and developers of tools that utilize Wikidata. I handed out pins and stickers throughout the three day conference.

My roommate during the event, Marianne Sweeny, will be one of three co-chairs at the 2017 Information Architecture Summit in Vancouver, March 22-28. She is very interested in developing a greater role for Wikipedia at the 2017 event and has asked me to prepare a proposal for engagement next year. Thoughts include an ongoing Wikipedia booth or table in the exhibition hall, train the trainers events, weekend long Editathon related to the conference theme, Game Night participation and other activities TBD.

I plan to share a report of the event at the May 25 meeting of the NYC Wikipedia meetup.

My goal for this event was to get more information architects involved with Wikipedia: what it is, why it aligns with their own work and how they can be involved. Last year’s editathon in Minneapolis was a good start. I am confident that this has been an important activity to build bridges to ensure that our communities support each other. Over time, the benefit to WMF of a collaboration with the IA community will be improved architecture and user experience based on sound information architecture practices.

As for the conference itself, my notes from the IA Summit sessions are available at: https://docs.google.com/document/d/14YuldZDpjoe6JEtIxB7qp5Ai0FjILaMc7UYrk8zCrT8/edit?usp=sharing

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Better Experience is the Payoff in Education

In Jon Kolko’s article, “Why Investment in Design is the Only Way to ‘Win’ in Education” (UX Magazine, September 16, 2014), he discusses how the value proposition of educational technology should be better education, and that the design of that experience should not be simply a “forgivable attribute.”

“…for us to collectively realize the benefits of advanced technology in the context of education, we need to treat the experience of learning as the primary ‘thing we are trying to improve.’ This requires empathy with the people doing the teaching and learning, which is gained through a qualitative design process.”

Read more at: http://uxmag.com/articles/why-investment-in-design-is-the-only-way-to-win-in-education