Head Instructor UXUI Immersive

The ask

Create a full time, ten week, immersive UXUI program at Wyncode. Define and build the entire curriculum and design a program that will leap frog students into a new career in Digital Product Design for Wyncode and South Florida, the first of its kind.

The syllabus

My first mission was to define a weekly set of objectives and goals. Once that was completed, I outlined the weekly schedule with more structure that included lectures, labs, and workshop sessions. I am solely responsible for the creation of materials and content, leading lectures as the Head Instructor, and facilitating labs with tools like Sketch, Invision, Keynote, Adobe XD. Additionally, I was responsible for the health and mentorship of every student.

Course summary

The UXUI full time immersive program consists of ten weeks, includes 300 lecture hours and 150 lab hours. All of this content was created as a unique non traditional education model for bootcamp structures. See our full program detail.

Curriculum foundation

After working in agencies, and large corporations like Google, Facebook, Samsung and many others I realized that every mission needs a roadmap or a plan if you will. The cohort content is largely based on a framework, everyone has a framework or a methodology. Mine is loosely based off of Design Thinking and Lean UX, it is flexible and guiding and most importantly it creates momentum. The framework will support any project scope and timing, the tasks to complete will largely depend on these details.

A collaborative & externalizing setting

In the classroom we work in teams and in collaboration, we externalize our work on the walls in accordance with Lean UX. When we externalize our work, themes are bubbled up and we are in a constant state of reminders, it also allows for all team members to get an update on the status of the work and the status of the overall project. We use Kanban boards (similar to a Trello or Jira) structure but with post it notes. And, did I say…we use A LOT of post it notes.

Teaching a UX philosophy

While following a framework, each phase has a set of tasks, it is key that students learn the vernacular, methods and best practices that will be utilized to support their design decisions. This knowledge allows students to become the experts in Product Design.

Tools

Students are taught that the arsenal of tools is wide and diverse. Many students say “which tool should I use?” But the answer is that every situation requires a different tool. Sometimes we demonstrate micro interactions in principle or flows in Overflow, and click throughs in Invision. Sketch is taught as the industry standard.

Working in design tools

Knowledge and speed of tools is key. We wireframe like maniacs in Sketch and prototype our flows in Invision, but we also work end-to-end in Adobe XD which allows us to use just one tool to create wireframes, UI, and prototyping, and has strong IXD capabilities.

Lectures & course materials

I create content and host events to support and build the Product Design community here in Wynwood, Miami and South Florida. Our mission is straight forward, create a reputation for Miami and South Florida that cannot be ignored.

Reading materials & analog tools

We use lots of analog tools, post its, and we read a lot! One that drives our entire experience and classroom environment is Lean UX, we remove waste by creating value not beautiful documents. Our wall is full of externalizing ideas and concepts in what we call “low-fi or low fidelity” meaning we avoid spending a lot of hours on making things pretty, but rather extract the real user need.

Results & outcomes

We couldn’t be more pleased with our efforts over the last 2.5 years, we’ve successfully completed 9 cohorts, we’ve changed many lives. Many of our graduates have obtained new sets of skills, we cover the spectrum of UX & UI, from research to workshop facilitation, UX Strategy, UX design, UI design and interaction design. Each student will fall on the spectrum in a specialized area or come away with the ability to work as an end-to-end product designer, sometimes referred to as a Unicorn.

Cohorts & class photos

Our class photos are constant reminders of all of our success stories. Although I am the instructor I learn constantly from my students, I value their feedback and use our surveys and NPS score to identify themes, what should I change, or what can I add to enhance the Wyncode UXUI experience.

Student feedback

My goal is to allow every student to feel confident in their new career and change lives. Our reviews and success metrics speak volumes for the success of the Wyncode program. Our internal surveys reveal positive outcomes with a constant score of 5 in a scale of 1 to 5, 5 being the highest rating.

Course report reviews

All non traditional educational institutions rely on feedback on Course Report. Our score is also a sign of success, we value our students feedback and experience and the reason I pour my heart and soul into the class is because of the students. See all of our reviews on Course Report.

Companies that hire our graduates

With all of our reviews, ratings, NPS scores, and feedback, our real measurement of success is if the students are getting hired. These companies have hired Wyncode UXUI grads. This is our sign that we are doing the right training. Students have been hired locally and also moved to other cities like New York with Amex, or North Carolina with Lowe’s among others.

Portfolio & case study development

Each class completes 3 projects, and creates a portfolio to showcase those 3 projects. The portfolio creation is an integral part of the process as this is what will get students their interviews and allow them ultimately to get hired. Each project gets showcased, and the grand finale is our “portfolio panel” where students walk industry leaders through their final project on their newly created portfolio. Feedback is provided and students are able to iterate and build upon their portfolios, pulling the rug closer to the right position.

Our accomplishments

A year in review is something we like to do in our process of restless reinvention and iterating. One of our favorite partnerships were with Tabernacle of Glory a very large religious organization. Their story was unique but not unusual, they needed a digital product and they wanted to do it themselves not hire someone that will not fulfill their needs nor know their customers.

Educating the community through events

We love a challenge and we love working with our community, our very first Art Basel event was held December, 2017 before the cohort even began. It was a great opportunity to understand UX and how we can solve problems and design for not just digital but physical spaces as well.

Art Basel Event

This year we hosted another Art Basel event in December, 2019 where the current students were able to shepherd guests through a digital product in a physical space. We partnered with Costa Farms, a billion dollar

My goals fulfilled

I will end this case study with the beginning. In 2017 I moved back to Miami from San Francisco, after working with the Googles and the Facebooks of the world. My goal was and is still the same. Nancy Dahlberg featured our goal in the Starting Gate, Miami Herald. I truly believe we have accomplished this goal and I will continue to evangelize and educate the community and beyond. See full article.

More press & events

Press & Events keep us busy, we are always pushing to educate the community, hiring partners and the masses.