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Ivy Global

Improving the way students study.

Ivy Global was created to help students study and feel confident when preparing for the SAT and ACT.

Ivy Global home screen with a predicted score graph and a Start AI Practice button
10 months
Duration
2
Designers
1
Developer
1
Project manager
2021
Year

Role · Lead UI/UX designer

I led the UI and UX design, working closely with the head of design for feedback and collaborating with the project manager to keep everything aligned and running smoothly.

Methods

  • Interviews · former SAT/ACT test-takers
  • Affinity mapping · FigJam
  • Personas
  • Wireframing & user flows
  • Moodboarding
  • UI Design
  • UX Design
  • User-Centered Design
  • Illustration
  • Animation
  • Design Thinking

The challenge

To level the playing field in test prep, Riiid Labs developed an AI-powered, budget-friendly platform that gives all students access to high-quality practice tests.

The goal: identify user pain points and opportunities to build a more accessible, personalized test-prep experience for high school students.

Illustration of a pencil aiming at a green target

Insights

To understand the real struggles students face, we spoke with former SAT and ACT test-takers about their experiences.

After transcribing all interviews, we created an affinity map in FigJam to cluster themes across different user types. It surfaced the core insights that directly informed our feature priorities.

Motivation & focus

  • “About halfway through studying I kind of lost steam.”
  • “I need deadlines to actually follow through.”
  • “How do I keep him engaged?”
  • “Students are easily distracted by their phones.”

Study tools & preferences

  • “Khan Academy is too much.”
  • “Practice tests are the most helpful.”
  • “I like flashcards for vocab.”

Access & equity

  • “I can't afford a tutor.”
  • “My district doesn't offer any SAT programs.”
  • “Equitable access is a big problem.”

Trust & visibility in progress tracking

  • “We need to know our son is actually improving.”
  • “I want data to share with parents.”
  • “I'm not sure which tools I can trust.”
Affinity map, 'What's getting in the way of students doing their best on the SAT/ACT?', with quotes clustered into four themes
Affinity mapping diagram

Main users, high school students

Using insights from the interviews, we segmented users by their core characteristics, primary challenges, underlying motivations and desired outcomes.

We created lightweight personas from these behavioral patterns to help the team understand user needs. They guided early decisions around onboarding and tone.

Persona card for Avery, a student who is motivated but overwhelmed, with traits, goals and frustrations
Persona, Avery
Persona card for Ethan, a budget-conscious self-starter, with traits, goals and frustrations
Persona, Ethan

Ideate solutions

Onboarding flow

The insights and personas guided my wireframe ideation, so each user flow directly addressed real needs and kept the experience streamlined.

Low-fidelity wireframes of the onboarding flow, from welcome and name entry to target score and study time
Onboarding wireframes

Home & practice test flow

The home screen is the main entry point for students. It needed to clearly show their practice-test progress and predicted target score, giving students a sense of where they stand and what they're working toward.

Wireframes of the home screen with predicted score, and the practice test question flow
Home and practice test wireframes

Moodboarding

As a team we created a moodboard to share with the executives. I organized it into distinct visual directions to help us align on the aesthetic and tone that would best support the user experience.

Moodboard organized into visual directions such as premium, approachable, safe, fun, minimalist, easy-going and formal
Moodboard breakdown
Ivy Global brand colors, three greens to yellow and orange, with Averta Bold and Averta Regular type
Colors & type

An AI-driven tutor

Tutoring is expensive for many students. Ivy Global offers an affordable alternative, an AI tutor that tracks progress and provides personalized SAT and ACT prep, so students arrive on test day well prepared and confident.

Ivy Global home screen and its scrolled view with weekly progress and practice sets
Home screen / home screen scrolled view
Close-up of the predicted score graph on the home screen
Close-up of practice sets with completion progress

Practice test

The practice test interface shows only the reference materials and the questions to complete, so students stay focused on the task at hand and simulate real exam conditions.

Practice test screens with a geometry question and a reading passage

Onboarding

A step-by-step onboarding lets students customize their study plan. From the start they identify where they most need to improve, set goals and build a tailored learning path toward their desired SAT or ACT score.

Onboarding screens asking how long to study daily and which sections to study, with 3D illustrations

Predicted score

Students take mini practice tests, called sets, that focus on specific areas of the SAT or ACT. After each set they receive a predicted score, real-time feedback that shows strengths and weaknesses and helps them adjust their strategy over time.

Home screen with a predicted score of 500 and a rising progress graph