FOLPER
Foster Care Mobile App
A mobile app that connects foster kids with peers in other areas, people who grew up in the foster care system, and supportive individuals and organizations, promoting mentorship and community engagement.
Role: UX Researcher, UX/UI designer
Toolkit: Figma, Figjam, Trello, zoom,Google Slides
UX Research
Project Overview
The Problem
I am struggling to find ways to help foster kids. I am trying to fill up my free time by doing volunteer work. But I don’t have a way to get into direct contact with foster kids that i can help. But the apps I see only allow me to adopt kids but not help them. Which makes me feel frustrated because I can’t help kids even though I have the appropriate resources
The Solution
Folper is a mobile app that connect volunteers with organizations that have foster kids/kids aging out o the care system.
Research Process
Research Plan:
“According to the province, just under 12,000 children and youth are in the child-welfare system. About half of youths who experience homelessness in Ontario were involved in that system, more than half drop out of high school and 57 per cent rely on social assistance, according to a 2017 report by the now-closed Office of the Provincial Advocate for Children and Youth.”
User Insight
Affinity Map
UX Design
User Insight & UX Hypothesis
User Insight
“After getting the results from our surveys and interviews regarding foster young adults and their struggles, we’ve discovered that James wants to help foster young adults but he doesn’t really get good directions on how to do it. Therefore, we believe this app can help users as James to not be frustrated anymore while looking for ways to volunteer himself and that we might be able to help if we develop a platform that brings volunteers and beneficiaries to collaborate together. We might do this by [giving volunteers the opportunity to help promote young adults to thrive by offering help by sharing their skills]. Doing this will allow our product to [be successful not only to bring together volunteers with foster young adults, but also improve society.”
UX Hypothesis
Having a foster app would help young individuals leaving the foster care system integrate back into society by providing a platform to connect volunteer helpers with young adults.
Proto Persona
Pain
Empathy Map
Journey Map
Story Board
I Like, I Wish, What If
Feature Prioritization
Value Proposition
GatherGO mobile app helps a group of adults to efficiently plan and coordinate a social outing while catering to everyone’s budget, time constraints, and mood.
Unlike GatherGO’s direct competitors who have failed, GatherGO focuses on having a modern UI design with a simple User Experience that simplifies the task of coordinating a social outing.
UI Design
Competitor Analysis
Strength
– Trusted and recognized platform
– Offers in-person and online volunteering
Weakness
– Did not invest in a visual identity
– Confusing navigation
Opportunities
– Developing clarity in navigation will be advantage
– Focusing on specialized volunteer programs can bring a sense of confidence to users
Threat
– Indispensable that that function of verifying registered users and institutions exists
User Flow Diagram
Based on user insight analysis a focus is given on 3 activities that would allow evaluate the user immediate experiences with the interface since these features attract users to try out the app. These activities were:
- Onboarding/ Sign-up
- Create outing plan
- Create a poll for the outing
Prototype
Low-Fi Prototype
Style Tile
Hi-Fi Prototype
Key Takeaways
Future Considerations
Although the Folper App will help connect volunteers with youth out of the foster care system, moving forward, it is intended to bridge the gap for users even more. More features that can help users use the app more efficiently will be added.
- Create a messaging feature that allows users to contact each other directly without having to go through other organizations.
- Creating more security for users by adding an extra security method when signing up and logging in
- Allowing volunteers to get updates on donations for specific uses.