In June 2018, the University of Edinburgh ran a top tasks survey to identify what information prospective students are prioritising when thinking about applying to university. In this post, I’ll talk about the method, why we ran the original survey, the insight we gained from it, and why it’s time to do it again.

We recently reviewed the new undergraduate study website with 19 students, using a summative usability testing approach to produce a performance scorecard. While the new site scored really well, we identified a few areas to improve further.

Our team went on campus during the recent Undergraduate Open Day to do some pop-up research and check some design concepts with prospective students and their parents.

I recently ran an open invite usability review for our latest round of usability testing. Normally I run these sessions within our team, but we wanted to involve colleagues across the University in our work to improve the editorial experience. It was also an opportunity for school editors to see the new degree programme editorial […]

I conduct a lot of usability testing remotely and I need to test on both desktop and mobile devices. It’s tricky to create a realistic environment for testing remotely on mobile devices. I’ve found a method called ‘laptop hugging’ that works really well.

Last month, I attended a World Usability Day (WUD) event at User Vision, a UX and service design agency in Edinburgh. By sharing my experience I hope it helps others to decide if they want to attend an event in the future.

Join us on Wednesday 22nd January to watch school editors using the new degree programme editorial interface.

I recently ran an open invite session review for our latest round of usability testing. Normally I run these sessions within our team, but we wanted to involve colleagues across the University in our work to improve the editorial experience. It was also an opportunity for school editors to see the new degree programme editorial […]

Join us on Wednesday 16 October 14.00-16.30 to watch school editors using the new degree programme editorial interface.

Testing what we develop with prospective students is fundamental to delivering a new website that is easy to use and meets their needs.  I’ve been responsible for making sure the team gets regular sight of students interacting with our work-in-progress through the course of the development leading up to our beta release.