Education & Life Goals

“Tailored Education”

SD - UX - IxD - UI

Mentor Connection

Mentoring can be a great way to share knowledge and help someone be successful in their personal or professional life. But many potential mentors are often too busy to commit to regular meetings, or they have a hard time connecting with people seeking help.

Deliverables

Design an experience for students (mentees) to connect with professionals (mentors) through a mitigated relationship provided by legal guardians, school counselors, and the educational agency.

Create a sequence of high-fidelity mocks.

Evolving Process

In the recent decade there has been an exceeded rapid growth in online education, career development and mentorship. However there is an opportunity gap between education and mentorship.

Help Make Decisions Early

By the time students need to make it to make an educational or career decision most are ill prepared or ill equipped. Currently public education systems base their foundation on general education abandoning healthy guidance to a tailored career direction.

Are the majority of high school students prepared to be successful in college on an academic level?

No. In fact nationwide, fewer than half of all high school graduates are prepared to earn even a “C” in their college courses. Instead of diving right into tinkering with graduation requirements, let’s focus on explaining students’ progress against those requirements in a way that’s more transparent with relevance to them and their families.

Do students know what they want to do after high school?

Findings show that high school students associate school and its development as a means to an end; leading to the root of an issue that there isn’t a clear and transparent goal in mind. This will mean actually asking students what they want to do after high school, and providing easy-to-understand updates on their progress toward their life goals not just when they graduate, but throughout their K-12 career.

Are schools and institutes facilitating students with programs/environments that not only teach hard skills but also soft skills in preparation for the workplace?

States are adopting online curricula, or in some cases, developing their own programs from the ground up. But some education experts argue that too much of the burden for training people on the professional skills they need is falling on educators; whom do not have the resources for all students.

Teaching Is About Knowledge | Hard Skills & Foundation

The role of the teacher is to share their knowledge through instruction and explanation. In the traditional sense, teaching involves formal lessons on a subject, often including a detailed lesson plan and methods of assessment.

A teacher’s first priority may be instruction—but they can be creative and interactive in their approach. They recognize and foster individuality, creativity and become mentors in their own right.

Mentoring Is About Experience | Soft Skills & Purpose

Mentoring, on the other hand, is more informal and relational in nature. A mentor acts as an advisor, sharing knowledge based on their lived experience. There’s more sharing between the two as mentors strive to help their mentees grow into peers.

And while a mentor’s priority is on personal development, the mentee must possess “know-how” skills. And so mentoring will always have an instructional component.

Teaching Focuses On “The How” | Mentoring Focuses On “The Why”

Before you can pen a great novel, you have to master the mechanics: from the fundamentals of grammar, style, and how to create a compelling story arc. That requires teaching.

Mentoring, on the other hand, focuses more on applying knowledge in practice. Not just how to do something, but why it’s useful. Mentors impart their wisdom, practical insight, and creativity to encourage learners to express and develop their own skills.

Mantees | Students

Pre-Primary (ages 3-6) | Compulsory

Pre-primary education is a critical stage in a students life as it’s designed to support early development in preparation for participation in school and society. Pre primary acts as a soft introduction to the Compulsory Education System (mandatory); however it is gathering more attention due to the elastic development of children’s minds.

“This early stage of development presents an opportunity to observe a child’s strengths early on.”

Primary (ages 7-12) | Society

Primary education is typically designed to provide older children with fundamental skills in reading, writing, mathematics, and the tools to establish a solid foundation for learning. At this stage students begin to grasp an understanding of fundamental approaches to their curiosity and interests; giving them a foundation to preemptive decision making.

“Near the end of primary education students whom have nurtured interest into life after high school begin the process of making a decision of which career to pursue.”

Lower Secondary (ages 12-15) | Curriculum

Lower Secondary (Junior High) education is typically built on the foundation of primary education with a more subject-oriented curriculum. This stage is where the education system starts to see a drastic disparity among student’s abilities.

“During junior high students typically start to question how their learnings are supposed to apply to the real world. At this stage, it would be a massive success to expose students to a mentor outside of the school system.”

Upper Secondary (ages 16-18) | Preparation

Second stage of secondary education and final stage of formal education for students typically is based around the requirements to graduate for adult education or providing skills relevant to employment.

“Fifteen years , from start to finish, summarize a student’s early life and education and 60% do not know what they will be doing for the rest of their life.”

College (Adults)

By providing information, guidance, and encouragement, mentors can play an important role in nurturing students’ college aspiration. In addition, mentoring for students in college helps them to feel more connected and engaged on campus, which can ultimately improve student outcomes.

“The delicate balance of mentoring someone is not creating them in your own image, but giving them the opportunity to create themselves.”

Mentors | Professionals

Beyond the classroom and lab, mentors assist students in career and life choices. Transitional times are most difficult for individuals who don’t have a clear understanding of the environment or situation they’re transitioning to.

• Goal-Setting | Mentors assist college students in determining their career aspirations, and work with students to achieve them.

• Networking | Because mentors are often well-known and respected in their field and community, they can connect students with other professionals, internships and jobs.

• Broadening the Scope of Knowledge | Along with introducing students to professionals and opportunities in their chosen field, mentors acquaint students with new resources and organizations

• Job-Seeking and Interview Skills, and Job Retention | Mentors are able to demystify the often overwhelming job-seeking and interview processes, and offer first-hand advice on how future graduates can stand out to potential employers. In addition, mentors advise students on maintaining career longevity.

Mitigate | School Counselors

School counselors should spend most of their time in direct service to and contact with students. School counselors' duties are focused on the overall delivery of the total program through guidance curriculum, individual student planning, and responsive services. In a nutshell school counselors have evolved to

• Mitigation | social problems, either with individual students or groups of students.

• Preparation | Providing students with readily available resources during academic challenges.

• Family Connections | Making connections with the student’s family can provide context to their character.

• One-on-One | Acting as a counseling role with students for mental health reasons or outside influences.

Liaison | Parents & Legal Guardians

Teachers and mentors support a student within a certain time frame usually taken place during the day or for a short period after school. Parents/guardians are the constant supporters when the student is not in school. Their role as support the most important not because they are the people who protect and raise the student; but how the student perceive them through their self image.

The primary role of the parent/guardian is to mitigate the relationships with involved parties. However, not all students share a stable and nurturing home life. This is when then bandwidth of mentorship can take on different roles in the student’s life.

• Character | In most cases the parents & guardians establish the core values of a child leading to jump starting life paths, relationships, and decisions.

• Enablers | A student is most successful and content when the resource of enablement is surrounding them.

• Protectors | Due to the potential early involvement with outside forces; parents always become the first line of defense for a child.

Administration | Institution

The educational state controls, mandates, and establishes a governance over the collective educational programs into a holistic ecosystem. This ecosystem is the vehicle towards what a student is taught at the required minimum under the US Compulsory Education Law.

• Control | The administration or institution of the educational state carries a lot of bandwidth for whether or not a program is accepted into the curriculum or school structure.

• Compliance | Ultimately if a mentorship program could conform within a state’s or district’s governing compliance policies then the likelihood of the product to succeed would greatly increase.

Design Criteria

Journey Map

Bringing in Iterative Process

Most individuals of all ages are able to setup any type of goal for their life. However to manage and track that goal can be challenging when faced with other life priorities. The start and ending of a developing goals are met with evaluation stages to help reinforce the purpose of the experience.

Happy path of a young student.

For the sake of the exercise and time restraints I wanted to focus primarily on the student’s experience from logining in to the iterative cycle of their education.

Systematically, how could it work?

Initiate a Goal

Beginning in elementary school, schools should ask students and their families about their post-secondary goals, and track the answers just as they would grades or other important academic information. This should happen at least once a year through the combination of school counselors, parents, and mentorships; since the students’ goals will evolve over time.

Report Cycle

Once schools know what students want to do after high school, report cards at every level could include a narrative section that clearly explains whether students are on track to meet their goals (not just graduation standards).

Holistic Report

When students graduate from high school, their diplomas should come with a report that clearly explains whether they are ready to take the next step toward their career goals. For example, is the student ready to be successful in a four-year college or not?

Three Pillars of Action

Academics Partnered with Goals

Linking Accounts

By utilizing already established ecosystems that a school uses provides a higher velocity. Using already adopted education management software like ‘Blackboard’ gives a direct line from the education administration to the app increasing accuracy and less manual input from the user.

Academics

Showing a historical reference of the student’s academic progress helps reinforce the importance of maintaining priorities while achieving goals. It also provides the opportunity of comparing both side to teach the student how to manage progress.

Goals

When Mentors are pair with a student they a task the individual with a related topic to enhance the student’s targeted goal.

Validating Progress

Administrative Analysis

Look and feel

Soft Shapes & Punchy Buttons

While striving to excel in both academics and life goals information can transform itself into a very stark appearance. This can create anxiety and a loss in user velocity. We combat this with soft shapes that project themselves as easy to use interactions.

Dominate Violets & Pale Colors

To further enhance a calm reaction from the users hues of violet and blue are recommended to induce a sense of calamity. These dominating colors are complemented by pale unobstructive colors.

The Future of Diplomas

This system would also provide policymakers and researchers with access to a wealth of new data about students’ life goals, and how many graduated on track to meet them. They could supplement these data by following students after graduation for example, to see how many students certified as “college ready” actually earned credit in their freshman courses or went on to earn a degree.

Tailored Education

That would open up new, more meaningful accountability measures for schools and school systems focused on what percentage of students (overall and by subgroups) go on to achieve their college or career goals. And it could lead to a more thoughtful conversation about changes to graduation standards, based on a clearer picture of how current standards connect to students’ lives after high school. Think of it being an easily adoptable IB program nationwide.

Continuing Education

This system could provide a new layer to continuing education across the country by exposing specific industries to aspiring new individuals. May provide an opportunity to create positive exposure. Would creating a cycle for professionals to learn as well as give back enhance a specific industry? A credit system built into the experience may create added value as an incentive to the mentor.

Evolve a Failed System

The more successful the school system measures up to the more incentives like funding may be provided at the state or even national level. Most importantly, this new view of diplomas would create powerful incentives for schools to reorient all their policies and practices around understanding and helping students meet their life goals. Instead of expecting students to adapt to the current one-size-fits all approach to school if they want to succeed, we’d start expecting schools to craft education programs for every student that acknowledge their potential and honor their aspirations. And we’d ultimately judge school systems not on how many of their students earn a paper credential, but on how many actually reach their goals after high school.

Student Empowerment

After reviewing my final designs and the strategy, I am left with the curiosity of how much this can be achieved. My initial prerogative was to create an ecosystem that seamlessly chains together a student’s end to compulsory education. By aiming for that goal, it was important to me that the initial interaction was very simple for a young mind whom could evolve with the student by adding “complexity” over time. I hope it came across that I did this by minimizing unnecessary information and making everything easy to digest. The challenge would be to implement this experience efficiently so that the student feels mostly in control versus being dictated by their development circle.

Unanswered Questions

What about parents/guardians who choose not to involve themselves into the experience?

What if the parents/guardians are ill equipped to make appropriate decisions? Could there be an attached outreach program to them?

Can a mentor also be a student in another area? How would that look with in the system?

Questions continue to develop.