Effortless Lab Creation and Management for Educators

Create Labs quickly.

Manage Labs with ease.

Overview

"Traditionally, creating and publishing labs in Azure Lab Services has required technical expertise, creating a barrier for non-technical educators to easily utilize the platform's powerful capabilities for their classroom needs."

Azure Lab Services is a cloud-based service that enables you to easily manage virtual machines in the cloud for various scenarios such as classrooms. However, currently, it can be challenging for non-technical users to use the service or seek help from technically savvy individuals. Our goal is to reduce the time and complexity required for users, such as K-12/University educators, to set up labs on their own. We aim to achieve this by minimizing the number of clicks required and automating as many steps as possible so that they can effortlessly deploy labs with minimal to no assistance.

Team A-Star

Sumaiya Sathar

Project Manager

Harshavardhini R

Product Manager

Gie Myung Lee

Back End Developer

Aravind Ramesh

Front End Developer

Internal Stakeholder:

Microsoft - Azure Lab Services

Azure Lab Services is a cloud-based solution for creating and managing virtual environments for different scenarios, such as classroom training, demonstrations, and testing.

It's designed to be cost-effective, scalable, and easy-to-use for educational institutions, training organizations, and corporate IT departments.

External Stakeholders:

K-12 / University Educators, Instructors, Students, IT Admins

Educators, instructors, and IT admins can use Azure Lab Services to easily set up and manage virtual environments for classroom demonstrations, training, and testing.
Students can access virtual labs to learn and experiment with different technologies without the need for physical hardware.
With Azure Lab Services, stakeholders can create and manage virtual labs efficiently, track usage, and control access to resources.

Step 1: Defining the MVP

Workflow and Objectives

☁️ Our MVP for Azure Lab Services simplifies the process of setting up virtual labs for non-technical users while catering to advanced users.

☁️ We identified user needs, simplified the deployment and set up process, and prioritized core functionalities. We launched the MVP quickly, gathered feedback, and made improvements based on user feedback.

☁️ The result was a platform that achieved our objectives of reducing complexity, automating setup, and increasing user engagement.

Step 2: Building the MVP

Key Features and Functionality

Automated Deployment: We provide a streamlined deployment process that minimizes the need for technical expertise, allowing non-technical users to deploy labs easily.

Access to Existing Labs: Our solution allows educators to access existing labs instead of having to create new ones from scratch, saving time and effort.
Minimal Clicks: We have reduced the number of clicks required to create new lab plans and resource groups, making the process faster and more intuitive.
Customizable Lab Templates: Our solution enables users to create customizable lab templates, allowing for easy setup and deployment of labs with different configurations.

Step 3: Designing the MVP

User Interface and Experience

🖥️Our design principles of intuitiveness, user-friendliness, and minimal clicks are reflected in the streamlined lab deployment process, allowing educators to create, access, and manage labs with ease.

🖥️We conducted extensive user research and testing to ensure that our design is both effective and efficient. We gathered feedback from educators and IT administrators to inform our decisions and make improvements.

🖥️Our design also takes into account the specific needs of K-12 and university educators, including the ability to customize lab resources and manage student access.

🖥️By empowering educators to easily create and deploy labs, we hope to promote equity and revolutionize the education sector by providing equal opportunities for all students to learn and succeed.

Step 4: Refining the MVP

Testing and Iteration for Improvement.

🔁 Our MVP went through four iterations to refine and improve the product.

🔁 Our team worked collaboratively to implement changes and ensure a seamless user experience.

🔁 The final product reflects the culmination of these iterations and is optimized for user satisfaction.

Benefit of our Solution

✅ Our solution simplifies the lab creation process for educators, making it easy to create and manage labs with minimal technical expertise required.

✅ A-Star's solution empowers educators to customize lab resources, and streamline deployment, saving time and resources.

✅ By using our solution, educators can expand their user base and provide equal opportunities for students to learn and succeed, regardless of their technical background.

✅ A-Star's solution offers a scalable, customizable, and cost-effective solution for educational institutions seeking to provide hands-on learning experiences for students.

Our Winning Features

✅ Create lab resources in just a few clicks, without needing technical knowledge: Our platform is designed to be user-friendly and intuitive, making it easy for educators to create and deploy labs.

✅ Minimal interaction required, with pre-configured virtual machines and templates: Our pre-configured templates and virtual machines save time and effort for educators, making it easier for them to manage labs.

✅ Simplify lab management with a centralized dashboard: Our centralized dashboard enables educators to manage their labs easily, from one convenient location. They can monitor lab usage, track student progress, and more.

Impact of our Solution

✅ 60% reduction in lab setup time: Educators can spend more time teaching and less time managing labs.

✅ A projected 30% increase in lab adoption and usage leading to greater retention of existing Azure customers, as well as the acquisition of new customers who value ease of use and flexibility of the platform.

✅ A projected 0.3X increase in revenue of Azure Lab Services due to increased adoption and usage of labs by educators.

✅ Scaling the MVP leads to cost savings for Microsoft, as the company can leverage existing infrastructure and resources to support a larger user base without significant additional investment.

Questions?

Contact harshar@uw.edu to get more information on the project

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