Product design / Campus community platform

Connect U

A campus community platform designed to help University of Waterloo Stratford students discover events, coordinate transportation, and find like-minded communities without relying on scattered informal channels.

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Case Study

Making a small campus feel easier to enter.

Connect U responds to a specific community problem: people wanted to participate, but activity information and transportation coordination were spread across too many informal channels.

The Challenge

The Stratford campus is geographically separated from the main campus, and many students live in Waterloo. Without a central community hub, events, carpooling, and social opportunities were easy to miss.

The Approach

We moved from broad campus research into a focused event discovery flow, then tested whether users could find, search, create, and join relevant community activities.

Step 01Research

Step 02Synthesize

Step 03Prototype

Step 04Validate

Problem Framing

The core issue was not a lack of activity. It was that information was too dispersed across group chats, Facebook, program channels, and personal friend networks. The product needed to collect scattered signals into one searchable campus layer.

The Outcome

The final prototype turned an abstract need for connection into clearer actions: browse events, post activities, search transportation options, and understand what was happening across the campus community.

Research context

The University of Waterloo Stratford campus serves GBDA and MDEI students, but it sits away from the main Waterloo campus. Many students chose to live in Waterloo because it was easier to stay socially connected, even though commuting made daily life harder.

Our survey included 14 GBDA students, 6 MDEI students, and 5 instructors or staff members. The research highlighted a pattern: users wanted community, but the practical path to finding activities and transportation was fragmented.

My role

I was responsible for the Events feature section. I created task flows, explored low-fidelity wireframes, designed high-fidelity screens, and translated research pain points into a product path from browsing to joining an event.

20/25Participants lived in Waterloo

22/25Actively sought or posted activities

10/10Found add-new-feed quickly

7/10Understood fast carpool search

Research to Interface

Artifacts that moved the team from problem to product.

The strongest case evidence is the transition from campus pain points to a specific event discovery and participation flow.

Connect U research synthesis board — **Research synthesis**Survey insights helped define the community and transportation problem around Stratford campus.

Connect U persona — **Persona**A provisional persona clarified the student motivations behind community discovery.

Connect U event task flow — **Task flow**The event flow focused on helping a user discover, understand, and register for an event.

Connect U low fidelity wireframe — **Low-fidelity wireframe**Early layout exploration for browsing and adding events.

Connect U high fidelity event screens — **High-fidelity prototype**Events screens moved the feature from sketch to testable product experience.

Connect U redesign comparison — **V2 redesign**After the initial project, I explored a softer neumorphic interface direction to improve visual clarity and product feeling.

What Changed

Community discovery became more concrete.

What started as a general need for connection became something much more concrete: search, browse, post, join, and coordinate.

Centralize activity information

Events and carpool posts moved from scattered channels into one place users could intentionally check.

Lower the social barrier

Clear event context helped users understand what an activity was and whether it felt relevant to them.

Learn from validation

The project taught me that community problems are often information problems first. Users did not lack interest; they lacked one visible, intentional place to understand what was available and how to join it.

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