CO·LAB - Connecting Students and Local Organizations Through Design

Nonprofits often lack budget for dedicated design roles, while students struggle to find projects with real stakeholders and constraints.

I asked myself: how might we help both students seeking more experience and local orgs that don’t have the budget for creative help?

I interviewed nonprofits and design students, grouped the notes into themes, and used that to focus CO·LAB on fairness and trust.

Students can find a project they like, understand the requirements, submit work, and understand usage rights.

User testing went well: testers completed every task without help, understood what the platform was for, and were clear on usage rights. Feedback on my early UI and UX, including text sizing, icons, and button placement, helped refine the final design.

I pulled together a small design system for CO·LAB so the product would feel consistent as I prototyped: the color palette, logo, typography, and a set of icons for navigation and key moments in the flow.

I would like to keep refining this further and bring more personality into the platform over time, but this is what I was working with for the project.

My main challenges were time and time management. I got pretty busy with my practicum placement while I was working on this project, so I had to stay honest about how much I could take on.

At times I was indecisive, especially when it came to the design system, and I sometimes focused on things that did not need that much attention yet. I started with a really large scope and had to narrow down a lot on what I could actually make in the time I had.

If I had more time to work on CO·LAB, I would like to start with the branding, so it overall feels more connected from screen to screen.

I would also want to work on the flows throughout the site, including onboarding, the organization side, and the profile and dashboard. For now this case study is really my MVP, so those are the pieces I would keep building out next.