Other Engagement Opportunities
The School of Information offers several opportunities for organizations to work with students outside of client-based courses, ranging from semester-long to single-day community organizing projects
Visit the official UMSI website for the most up-to-date information on client based courses
Information on the site you are currently visiting is no longer being updated as of Summer 2021
Design Clinic
What is Design Clinic?
In Design Clinic, interdisciplinary teams of four to six bachelors and masters students, mentored by professionals, collaborate and innovate on fast-paced, self-driven, semester-long projects, acting as consultants by managing projects, scoping deliverables, executing on mutually-agreed upon outcomes, and creating a plan for sustainable implementation. Project areas include librarianship, digital preservation, data science, and user experience design, and dependent on the needs of the project, student teams may leverage Design Thinking methodologies, data analysis skills, digitization strategies, and user-centered design to produce prototypes for their client.
Deliverables
What do clients receive for participating in this course?
Design Clinic deliverables are determined mutually between students and clients, and include but are not limited to:
User research reports
User experience testing
Personas
Information architecture updates
Workflow strategy and documentation for archival work
Digitization of files
Data cleaning, analysis, and visualization
Prototypes for a new or redesigned website, application, database, dashboard, or other digital tool
Client Eligibility
Who can participate?
Potential clients should meet the following criteria:
Able to meet with the student team at least once a week throughout a period of 13 weeks
Able to work with students to scope the project, define deliverables, and provide clear feedback on progress
Able to provide relevant information and context to student teams about their company, organization, and/or project
Projects should have a certain level of establishment. Clients shouldn’t make any major pivoting during the project, which can disrupt students work
Projects
What kinds of projects are appropriate for the program?
Potential projects should meet the following criteria:
Able to be completed in 13 weeks
Include a set of projected deliverables
Provide evidence of access to the target user group and/or data set prior to the start of the semester
Include opportunities for creative and innovative exploration of the challenge
What are some examples of successful projects?
Check out this final project: FoodFinder: Connecting People to Food Resources
Poster (Fall 2020): Supporting a Local Business to Pivot During COVID-19
Presentation (Fall 2020): Data gathering experience for digital conferences
Presentations from our 2020 Student Project Exposition
Communication Design. Students analyzed Comerica Bank's current methods of internal communications, looking for ways to improve those methods or introduce new methods to help increase internal engagement.
Assessing Risk for Older Adults. Students helped a local nonprofit develop an online assessment tool for caregivers, to increase awareness and utilization of the resources available to help them avoid and respond to potential crises.
Interface Updates to Messenger Bot. Students assisted a company developing a Facebook Messenger bot designed to interact with students traveling internationally.
Data Analysis of Trends in US College and Research Libraries. Students conducted analysis on three data sets for academic librarians regarding faculty status, determining trends over time and answering questions about the connection between faculty members receiving doctoral degrees from research universities and likelihood of receiving tenure.
Smart Finance with Alexa. Students assisted NBC Universal in creating a voice experience in the finance space for millenials, researching the problem space, interviewing potential users, building personas, and prototyping ideas.
How many projects are selected for this program?
Winter 2021: 6 projects*
Fall 2020: 10 projects*
* Due to variability in the number of enrolled students each year, this number is only a rough estimate.
Timeline
Fall Projects (September–December)
June – August
Client submits project idea
Client Engagement Team (CET) reviews project idea and requests full project proposal
CET works with client to scope and refine proposal
August – September
Design Clinic staff present projects to students
Students choose their project
September–October
Students begin project
December
Students finish project and provide deliverable(s) to client
Client provides feedback & students integrate into final version
Winter Projects (January–April)
June – December
Client submits project idea
Client Engagement Team (CET) reviews project idea and requests full project proposal
CET works with client to scope and refine proposal
January
Design Clinic staff present projects to students
Students choose their project
January – February
Students begin project
April
Students finish project and provide deliverable(s) to client
Client provides feedback & students integrate into final version
Participate
How do I become a client?
Potential clients should complete this brief form with their contact information and a short summary of their project idea. Our Client Engagement Team will review your submission and reach out to you within 3 business days with next steps.
What if I don't have a project right now, but I'm interested in future opportunities or want to learn more?
If you don't have a specific project in mind for the upcoming semester, but would like to stay informed about future opportunities to work with students through our client-based courses or other programs, complete this registration form to be added to our mailing list.
Former Clients
Who's participated in the past?
What do they have to say?
"The students created advanced mockups of a new user interface for our Builder tool that we'll use to guide product development of both the Builder and the entire application. They've also given us a new approach to product development—the way they conducted interviews and the processes they outlined for turning their interview notes into real, actionable items is a process we'll definitely be trying to replicate going forward."
Connor Stec, DocNetwork, Inc.
"I'm extremely thankful to the wonderful students who helped us design a better outcomes calculator. They helped us think of the offering as something more and imagine a better, more well-rounded version of the product—I firmly believe that it will be well-received by our clients and create an impact in the lives of patients."
Varun Joshi, ArborMetrix