THE CHALLENGE

The U.S.'s largest Bachelor of Science and Nursing program wanted to maintain its leading position by  identifying opportunities to improve its learner experience, automate processes, and intelligently apply AI. We were brought in to conduct a discovery of the entire prospect-to-graduate student journey to identify and define tangible initiatives for a 5-year roadmap.

OUR PROCESS

We always start by talking to stakeholders. This helps us build understanding and consensus around scope, barriers, known issues, previous relevant work, and areas where further inquiry is required. From these sessions we created a full research plan including study material and learner segmentation so that we could gather insights from different types of learners with differing perspectives and experiences across the lifecycle journey.

Based on hours of student interviews, call center transcripts and sitting in on live classes, we were able to identify two primary learner personas, and a list of friction points for each persona across the student experience. We categorized these friction points by frequency and severity, to create an aggregate friction score. We assigned a business value score to each friction point based on tactical impact to retention and academic success, to help us prioritize the impact of each friction to the organizations key results and measurement strategy. 

By aligning with core and peripheral stakeholders, we defined a prioritized backlog of initiatives and solutions that were added to the 5-year transformation roadmap.

OUTCOMES

We uncovered 100+ major friction points across the online learner journey. These converted to 5 no-brainer quick wins, 7 do-now initiatives, and 6 do-next fast follows. These items were added to the 5-year transformation roadmap, and will be rolled out to the tens of thousands of students in the university's online BSN program.