Case Study 1 - Empowering Tutors: Enhancing Essay Review Satisfaction by 90%

Background

The primary users were the Essay Review tutors. During their shifts, tutors received student-submitted essays and reviewed them within a specified time frame.

A product update eliminated the ability for tutors to preview essays before starting their reviews, leading to significant dissatisfaction.

Ninety-nine percent of Essay Review tutors expressed dissatisfaction with the current workflow and user experience.

The User Problem

The main issue with the Essay Review process was that tutors had no option to decline essays if they were uncomfortable with the subject matter. Additionally, they lacked visibility into the number of essays they had reviewed or the remaining essays in the queue, which significantly impacted their morale.

Project Overview

My role

Lead Product Designer
Defined project vision and strategy
Conducted UX research
Designed the complete feature

Who I worked with

Frontend & Backend engineers
Data scientists
Product Manager

Timeline

2 weeks

Problem Statement

How might we transform the essay review process into a more enjoyable and satisfying experience?

Research

Wireframes

Essay Pop-up

Overall: A significant number of essay reviewers (34%) have a baseline expectation that this level of insight into the essays they’re picking up to grade as well as their overall stats be readily available. Almost all of the remaining (59%) would see this as a value-add.

Essay Picked-Up

Overall: 68% of essays reviewers would find the themes and automatic word count and time spent to be value adds. Only 10% disliked them.

Pass-On Essay

Overall: This feature generated the most excitement among essay reviewers, with 84% of indicating they like it and only 6% indicating they dislike it. However, it received a divided response among platform managers.

Reviewed Essay List

Overall: Essay reviewers generally did not find this feature to be useful, with 62% feeling neutral about it. There wasn’t necessarily much negative about the view (aside from some concerns about student privacy), but they felt they would seldom need to review past essays and that product development time would be better used elsewhere.

Constraints for this feature

Limited time & resource

Technical constraints

Policy constraints

Key Principles when Designing

Empowerment: Enable tutors to make decisions by providing the option to pick-up or pass-on.

Efficiency: Streamline the workflow to enhance productivity and reduce friction for tutors.

Accessible: Highlight and prioritize the critical information tutors need to perform effectively.

Research Insights

Tutors want clear and consistent policies and guidance across all aspects of their work. This includes transparency around how metrics are used by managers to evaluate their effectiveness and more detailed instructions on acceptable time ranges for reviewing different types of essays.

Additionally, they seek greater insight into the platform’s inner workings—such as how essays are assigned (especially when the queue is low), what happens to essays that are repeatedly declined, and how unusual cases are managed.