Winner of Boston University’s “Catalyst” Designathon 2021 & Winner of UC Riverside Blackstone Launchpad “Ideas Competition” 2022
MeTime
A digital solution to burnout, skill building, and improving mental health
MeTime Demo for Senior Design Project
Video Submission for Boston University’s “Catalyst” Designathon 2021
Turning MeTime into a real product
After winning the 2021 Boston University Designathon Catalyst in the Health & Wellness Track, I had an opportunity to make this project as a part of my Senior Design Project for my B.S. program in Computer Science during my last year. I had some group teammates join and help implement this into a web application using Next.js, MongoDB, and Google Cloud Platform to use Google Calendar and Google Places APIs.
The MVP we envisioned by the end of the quarter was to allow users to grant access to reading/writing to their Google Calendar into the application along with which city they are currently in, then the application will find free time within the calendar and suggest available activities or events that they can participate in the user’s city.
The product that we created was able to do most of this, but given the time constraints and the difficulties we ran into, we had to assume that users were located in Riverside, California, where our university is located. Currently, I am working alone to refine this application to implement this functionality on top of other important features and publish the site for others to use.
My Role
During the 48 hour designathon of MeTime, I took on a multiple roles:
UX Research: User interviewing (1-on-1 user interviews utilizing social media platforms) and data analysis
UX/UI Design: Creating lo-fi and hi-fi wireframing, mapping out user flows and user personas, and prototyping the hi-fi wireframes together
Additionally, I researched competitors and how to make MeTime stand out as an impactful application
When implementing this application, I took on additional roles, in regards to the development and business aspects:
NextAuth (for user authentication and login)
Google Calendar API (for reading/writing to user’s digital calendar)
Frontend Development (for pages of Next.js web application)
Creating a business model canvas (value proposition, revenue streams, licensing, market analysis, customer segments, and target audience)
Working in an agile scrum environment as a scrum master and lead developer
How it started
We researched and referenced a variety of related and non-related applications such as calendar management, productivity, self-care, and mental health; for example, Stoic, Co-Star, Headspace, Picky, and Flo. We wanted to understand how users interacted with these apps, how it integrates into their daily lives, and how they are innovative and stand out from the competition.
Our inspiration
We researched and referenced a variety of related and non-related applications such as calendar management, productivity, self-care, and mental health; for example, Stoic, Co-Star, Headspace, Picky, and Flo. We wanted to understand how users interacted with these apps, how it integrates into their daily lives, and how they are innovative and stand out from the rest.
What we learned
As students from different universities, locations, and areas of expertise, we learned how to compensate for what the other lacks as well as get out of our comfort zone in trying new things. Communication and trust were key to completing this project as some of us were from a different time zone. With this project, we were able to learn from each other under the pressure of time; some of us were able to learn how to do user flows and hi-fi prototyping on Figma for the first time, and others were able to learn new shortcuts on Figma.
How we built it
Before starting our hi-fi prototype, we spent a lot of time on general and user research. We discussed and shared how we would like to approach the concept of health and wellness for college students. We conversed on whether to focus on physical or mental health, who is our main user(s), how to survey them, and what features will stand out with this app in particular. We brainstormed ideas, personas, and user flow(s) on Miro, surveyed college students via Instagram Polls, made a digital sketch via Adobe Illustrator, created the prototype app via Figma, and organized a presentation via Google Slides.
Challenges we faced
Besides the differences in time zones, some challenges we faced as a team was that we had no designated roles, no real solid plan in the face of unexpected occurrences, and our personal well being (i.e a teammate had other events going on in their life, and another teammate joined the Designathon after finishing their exams).