Usability Evaluation and Redesign of an Offline-First SAAS EdTech Tool

Company: Learning Equality
This is an evaluative research project that I led for Learning Equality. The high level objective of the study was to understand how users interpret and utilize the teacher dashboard to monitor student progress and how that informs the design to better support their decision making and workflow efficiency.
Some information has been removed or modified due to confidentiality.
Background
One of the core features is the coach dashboard, a tool that enables educators to monitor learner progress in real time. While powerful in theory, educators reported difficulty using the dashboard to effectively track student performance and take informed action.
Goals
Generative Goals
  • Understand how teachers use student performance data in real-world classrooms
  • Explore opportunities to simplify and reorganize dashboard content to support faster comprehension
  • Identify what types of data educators find most useful or actionable for instruction
Evaluative Goals
  • Identify usability bottlenecks and pain points that hinder teacher efficiency in the dashboard
  • Identify areas of cognitive overload and poor visual hierarchy in the current interface
  • Test comprehension of key dashboard elements like quiz scores, lesson completion, and engagement time
  • Measure user confidence in making instructional decisions based on dashboard insights
  • Evaluate navigation clarity between group-level and individual student views
Assumptions
Research Questions
  1. How do teachers currently interpret and use learner performance data during instruction?
  2. Where are the opportunities to improve the structure, flow, or presentation of the dashboard?
  3. Do teachers experience difficulty navigating and locating key information within the dashboard?
  4. How clearly are key metrics, such as quiz scores, lesson completion, and engagement time, understood by users?
  5. How confident do teachers feel using the dashboard to support real-time instructional decisions?
Research Plan
Research Methods
  1. Stakeholder Interviews - To understand business goals, technical constraints, and stakeholder expectations before shaping the research scope
  2. In-depth User Interviews (Semi-Structured) - To explore how teachers interpret and use the dashboard in context, uncovering deeper motivations and challenges that aren’t visible through observation alone
  3. Heuristic Audit - To quickly identify usability issues and visual design flaws in the existing dashboard using established usability principles
  4. Usability Testing (Structured) - To observe real educators performing tasks with the dashboard and measure where friction or confusion occurs in a repeatable, objective way
  5. SUS Survey (System Usability Scale) - To gather a standardized, quantitative measure of perceived usability before and after design changes, enabling clear comparison
  6. Affinity Diagramming - To synthesize qualitative data from interviews and usability tests into themes and insights that informed the design strategy
Participants
  • 7 teachers across India, Guatemala, and Uganda
  • All had experience using Kolibri in low-bandwidth classrooms
  • Participants included both primary and secondary teachers
Restraints
  • Remote testing in low-connectivity regions
  • Limited session time due to teacher availability
  • Language and cultural differences required clear, translated materials
  • Testing needed to balance realistic classroom use with digital prototyping limitations

Crucial Insights

  1. Visual Overload and Poor Information Hierarchy
Teachers felt overwhelmed by the volume and layout of the data on the dashboard, which made it difficult to focus on key information.
  1. Unclear Icons and Labels
Labels like “engagement time” and visual indicators were often misunderstood or misinterpreted, leading to confusion about student progress.
  1. Hidden or Hard to Find Features
Some important actions such as switching between different classes to individual learner profiles were not easily discoverable leading to inefficient navigation.

Redesign Process

Using the key findings, I worked with the other UX designers on my team to iterate the design, generating ideas for an improved dashboard. During these sessions, we sketched out layouts that focused on clarity and highlighted key features. We also tested these designs with teachers to get direct feedback on early design concepts. Our designs prioritized simplified data displays, clear labels, visual status indicators, and easy work flows for key tasks.

Research Impact

User Impact

As a result of my research, feedback reported that the redesigned dashboard gave teachers greater confidence in making instructional decisions.

SUS Score increased from 62 to 85
Operations Impact

The improved dashboard design reduced the time it took for teachers to find key student performance data and take action.

Reduced task completion time by 45%
Business Impact

While difficult to quantify, the redesigned dashboard experience supports Learning Equality’s broader mission in global education initiatives and the platform’s improved usability will lead to long-term user adoption.

My Learnings

Want to get in touch?

Email me at Jocelyn.KYK.Barron@outlook.com