This project came about from a course I took for my M.A. at Michigan State University called “Ethnography and Interaction Design.” The goal of the course was to use advanced user research and agile software development methods to create a website to support community deliberation about the Michigan Avenue Corridor Project.
Our roles in this course were interaction designer, database programmer, and Ruby on Rails developer. Before coding we used a variety of user research methods including: contextual inquiry, fieldwork, persona creation, and experience mapping to understand the “corridor” from the perspective of different types of users: government planners, small business owners, community leaders, and citizens. As we analyzed the collected data, we developed mock-ups various website features tat seemed appropriate for supporting public decision making involving economic, environmental, infrastructure and other technical knowledge specializations.
Coding was done in Ruby on Rails. My group specifically worked to develop a “mapping feature,” which allowed users to identify quality spaces and potential improvement opportunities in the corridor. Below are snapshots from our focus group where we demo’d on paper the functionality of the mapping feature for community members. Also, included are screenshots from the final site that went live.
The project demonstrates my ability to conduct research, perform analysis, work within an Agile environment, and turn concepts into functional code
Learn more about the corridor project
Learn more about the course that developed this project
Read a Greater Next Lansing article about OurMichiganAve.org
Read the Capital Gains article about the OurMichiganAve.org project
