Team 12: CS Villagers

A. P1A: Project Proposal Report

The motivation behind wanting to create a platform to allow students to easily find study

and project partners is to create a relationship between students who have the same interests.

Students just want to learn and understand the course material presented to them and apply this

knowledge to pass their assessments and projects, which ultimately results in passing the class.

Right now, the easiest way for students to find study and project partners is to talk to people in

their classes. We wish to find a solution to finding study and project partners that implements

technology. Technology would allow students to easily connect to each other and find people

with the same interests as them to create successful study groups and project groups.

Classes can range as small as fifty students to as large as three hundred students. It would

be nearly impossible for students to connect to every student in their class to find if a student

could be a potential and successful partner, especially in the larger classes. We hope that

technology will provide an easier way for students to interact with each other. Hopefully, our

solution will allow for students build study and project groups that allows them to become

motivated to study and be successful in their classes.

There are many important characteristics of Georgia Tech students - the user group we

are focusing on - who are looking for people to study. Georgia Tech students have many

positive attributes which are the reasons why they attend this school. Students at Georgia Tech

are smart and school-oriented - students who were at the top of their class in high school. Along

with that, the students are very technical, tackling math and science courses that many people

outside of Georgia Tech would never take. Finally, the users are passionate - participating in

extracurricular activities that align with their interests and major.

Team 12: CS Villagers

Georgia Tech students, however, also have some negative stereotypes. One of the main

attributes is that Georgia Tech students are socially awkward, a characteristic that exists due to

the students being too busy to spend time socializing. Activities that make these students busy

range from startups to clubs to heavy course loads. Another negative attribute that is associated

with Georgia Tech students is introvertedness. Students are often used to spending time alone,

working on hobbies and interests, so they sometimes prefer to be in solitude or they just do not

have time to find dates, other friends, or potential partners for projects. A lot of the classes

offered at Georgia Tech are large, containing around 100-300 people, which makes it hard to

create relationships with classmates.

In order to best get information on out user group, we will need to collect several

different types of data. The most important type of data we need to collect is interview data. We

will go to students in the culc and west village to ask them about current study groups. If

students are in a group, we will ask them how they met. If not, we will ask them if they have

study groups for their classes. We will also ask them about their opinions on study groups and if

they have used any apps or other technologies to find study groups in the past.

Also, we will collect data on the potential user group by using surveys and looking at

web content. We will put a survey out on social media websites and send them to people we

know. The survey will contain the same or similar questions to the ones that will be in the

interviews. This data should give us information on who our potential users are and how they can

most benefit from study groups. By looking at web content, we will be able to view attempted

solutions to this problem and identify shortcomings of previous attempts.

Team 12: CS Villagers

The feedback we received from the P1A Presentation depicted that the original problem

space was not a real issue. Nobody saw a need for a dating app exclusively for CS majors. Even

if there was a need for a redefined dating app, many students felt that the defined user group, CS

majors, was too narrow. It seemed to be a niche problem space that only we thought needed to be

addressed. Instead, students wanted an app that was inclusive of all Georgia Tech students. Thus,

we made the executive decision to pivot. We redesigned our problem space to encompass the

issue of trying to find study and project partners in various classes, especially in classes that

contain a high volume of students.

B. User Research and Task or Problem Analysis

1. Task Narrative

a. Please see the additional attached called TaskNarrative.pdf.

2. More details

a. The environment in which the problem of finding study partners occurs is

inside classrooms. Some classrooms can have as much as three hundred students.

Interacting with almost every student to find suitable project and study partners is

almost impossible. It was observed that many students use class message boards,

such as Piazza, to post a message about looking for partners. Students can post on

Piazza in public (such as a classroom) or private settings (the students’ own dorm

room) since this platform is a web based application.

Message boards allow students to post a message with as many details as

they please as they look for potential study and project partners. There are no
Team 12: CS Villagers

interruptions because students are able to post their messages in their own free

time. The only constraints of this method of looking for partners is that there is no

personal aspect to finding partners. The students will not be able to physically

interact with each other, unless the students verbally plan a meeting up period.

b. A strength of using message boards to find study and projects partners is that

the platform is made so that every student in the class can see the student’s

message of looking for partners. Students are also notified of when they have

received replies to their message, allowing them to respond to potential

acceptances or general messages. The problem to this method is a student having

no responses whatsoever. Sometimes students are either socially awkward or do

not wish to publicly have their messages shown to an entire classroom. Thus,

there is the problem of people not responding to a student’s message, thus leaving

the student with no partners to study or work with. This issues results in the

possibility of the student failing an exam or having to rely on the teacher

assigning partners which could also lead to failure of an assignment if the group

assigned is not cooperative.

c. Please refer to P1 2 c.pdf.

3. A description of the larger social and technical system or context

a. The solution needs to be able to be applied to the larger technical system in

different ways. First, this solution will have to work online. Having a website/web

app is the easiest way to reach the most number of people. Many people feel that

installing an app is too much of an investment if they are just doing something
Team 12: CS Villagers

quick. Therefore, if a student only needs a study group for one class and thinks

they can find people fast, a web application would be best. However, since most

people need to find study partners for multiple classes, a mobile app would be an

appropriate approach.

This eventual prototype would be used at the beginning of the year when

professors are assigning semester long projects. Students would be able to find

partners that they are suitable to work with for the whole semester to deliver a

successful project. The prototype will also be used within the semester as tests

and mini project assignments are assigned. Students can create study groups when

they have an upcoming exam. Students can either remain with the same study

group for the rest of the semester, and thus, only use the prototype once, or they

can use the prototype multiple times if they wish to meet new people. The

prototype would be a system that would support collaboration because the intent

is to work together to formulate study groups that best fit their personality and

study habits.

4. User Research Report

a. Please refer to Table A on P1_Table.pdf.

5. Analysis of User Research Data

a. Please refer to Table B on P1_Table.pdf.

6. User Personas
Team 12: CS Villagers

a. Please refer to User Personas.pdf.

7. Research Implications

a. The research that has been conducted has led to being able to draw

conclusions about our users and the problem they face. Our research has

identified that most students form study groups with their friends. If they do not

have any friends in their class, some might try to meet new people that sit around

them in class or just study by themselves. However, for most people, this does not

end up working because typically the people sitting next to them in class have

different personalities than them or have different study habits and techniques.

We were also able to identify that there were not any good solutions to the

issue of finding study groups. Currently, if students need to find study partners

outside of the people they sit near, they typically use piazza. The problem with

piazza is that there are so many questions being posted that those requests for

study groups often get lost in the noise. Most students have not used apps for

finding study partners. This is because there are not many apps out there, and the

ones that are available cannot refine the matching process well so you end up

having to go through many people before finding someone in their class with

agreeable personality types and study habits.