ISKME: Open Sourcing Educational Content for Librarians
The Institute for the Study of Knowledge Management (ISKME) is a leader in providing open educational resources (OER) to state libraries nationwide. Noticing librarians' need for a better way to share vetted OER content, ISKME and I worked together to design the current version of the OER Exchange in 2022, which is a platform designed to improve the sharing experience and help educators access high-quality materials for the classroom.
Services
UX Design
UI Design
Design Research: Generative and Evaluative
Client
Institute for the Study of Knowledge Management
Audience
State Library Database Administrators for Open Educational Content, Educators (K-12 and college)
Team
Margarita Zulueta, UX Designer
Product management team, engineering team (frontend and backend), education and library systems team
Year
2022 to 2023
🌟 The Objective:
Build a platform that enables librarian administrators to easily share trusted OER content, helping educators find quality materials quickly and without the need for extensive research. With the vast amount of OERs available, our platform aimed to create a streamlined sharing process, fostering a more efficient and community-driven way of exchanging educational resources.
View the Feature Overview here
🤝 The Deliverables:
Designed and prototyped a cross-repository search platform.
Developed user flows and created a design system for the engineering team.
Led user research with academic researchers to ensure the platform aligned with the needs of librarians and educators.
Delivered a beta version of the OER Exchange, featuring collection sharing, metadata mapping, and content discovery tools.
🥳 The Results:
The OER Exchange platform (currently in beta) has empowered librarians to share curated collections with ease and enabled educators to find and adopt relevant materials. The integration of metadata mapping and collection subscription features ensures that resources are shared efficiently and accurately, saving time for all users involved.
💡 The Process
The project began with in-depth research and collaboration with librarians and educators to understand their needs for sharing OER content. I led ideation sessions, prototyped user flows, and continuously tested designs with stakeholders to ensure the platform was intuitive and met user expectations.
👩🏻💻 As the design lead…
I managed the end-to-end design process, from user research and ideation to usability testing and prototyping user flows to collect user feedback. I also created a design system to ensure consistency across the platform, working closely with the engineering team for a smooth implementation.
🤨 The primary challenge was…
balancing the needs of multiple stakeholders while ensuring that the platform remained intuitive for all users. Navigating ambiguity in requirements was another hurdle, but close collaboration with the product and engineering teams helped clarify the vision and prioritize key features for the beta release.
🙌 Our impact…
By working directly with ISKME and educational professionals, we successfully created a platform that improved the OER sharing process, leading to greater resource accessibility and a more efficient workflow for librarians and educators.
📝 Project Summary
This project sharpened my ability to design complex, user-centered platforms while working cross-functionally to align design goals with stakeholder needs. I can highlight this experience to show my ability to lead end-to-end design processes and create impactful products in a collaborative environment.
