In the many years that UX Academy has been providing affordable, quality UX education we have also produced many successful alumni who have gone on to begin or further their career in UX. To illustrate the kind of projects and skills that you will master on our course, we have put together a blog of some of our brightest alumni. Scroll down to see what the graduates have been up to since completing their courses and what aspirations they have for the future.
Tim Penton
About Tim
Prior to joining UX Academy, Tim was a front end developer, that then moved into product design which was more in line with his degree. However, Tim started to miss the fast paced environment of digital and wanted to move back into this industry. Tim picked UX as he found it interesting and seemed to match his previous experience.
Why UX Academy?
“A friend and I worked together to improve our CVs and portfolios to meet UX and UI roles, and tried to gain experience within the company we were in, but found it very difficult to move across and gain experience within the UX and UI team. As I couldn’t really afford to stop working and pay the high prices of other courses I stumbled across UX Academy. The course was a good price and spread over a few weeks to help me go away and do my own research.”
Whats the most valuable lesson you have learnt at UX Academy?
“I think the main benefit to me was learning how to best present my work/research as well as learning that I was going in the right direction giving me confidence to keep applying. Another big benefit was discussing ideas with other class mates and tutors.”
How has the course helped prepare you for your new role as a UX Designer?
“I think the course helped me prepare for the breadth and variety of what UX involves, as well as seeing what areas I was good at and where I needed to read up more and get some more experience.”
Tim’s Project: Trading Skills
Trading Skills is an app that allows people to trade skills depending on what they need. The Trading Skills application is where you spend however many hours you have earned by helping others. For example, hours spent baking a cake can be exchanged with child care within the local community or helping someone with a DIY project around the house. Following a step by step process in the app allows you to create an advertisement with what you skill need, in what location, what date and for how many hours.
You can view the full story behind “Trading Skills” below. See how Tim went from the initial concept, to user research, testing, creating storyboards and more until he got to the finished project. Tim’s project is one of the many innovative and creative ideas our students have developed while they have been at UX Academy. If you would like to develop your own project like Tim, then a UX Academy course may well be right for you.
Tim Penton – Trading Skills, UX Academy Project from MobileUXLondon
Gaby Rock
About Gaby
Gaby is one of our newest Alumni having completed the Foundation UX Course in June 2018. Before she attended the Academy, Gaby worked as an in house Graphic Designer for a cosmetics brand. Gaby made the decision to try and develop her career and get into UX design. She also hopes to develop an app in the future, which you can see more of below, and says our Foundation in UX and UCD course has given her a much better understand of UX and UI, and the processes behind creating/designing an app.
What are some the most valuable things you have learnt at UX Academy?
“How valuable planning is. Also, I am excited to have learnt the different processes that go into UX and the thought behind the planning stages.”
About BeeHappy
BeeHappy is a digital app that focuses on improving career progression and productivity through boosting employees health and wellbeing. Gaby’s idea when starting to create BeeHappy was to create an app that improves the health and wellbeing of employees and thus increase work performance through the use of soulful techniques such as meditation, breathing, and exercise.
The importance of an app like BeeHappy cannot be understated. Gaby’s research identified that a third of days taken of work through illness in the UK are a direct result of work-related pressure or stress. This has a big impact on productivity and indeed the whole economy. That is why an app like BeeHappy could prove so helpful to workers and indeed employers across the country.
To find out more about BeeHappy and see how Gaby developed her idea, check out her presentation.
Peter McCarthy
About Peter
Peter successfully graduated from UX Academy in 2018 after working on an exciting and innovative app that aims to improve interactions and communications between housemates. Before joining the Academy, Peter was working within market research through a range of methods including online surveys, focus groups and observations. After Peter heard about the exciting area of UX design he wanted to explore it further. He chose UX Academy as we offer “an evening course at an affordable price.”
What’s the most valuable lesson you learnt at UX Academy?
“One of the most valuable lessons we learnt on the course was when you’re designing a product or service is that you need to keep the user at the centre of what you’re doing at all times. Test, redevelop and test again until you get the outcome you’re looking for. It’s important not to fall into the trap of building a website and only testing it a week before it goes live.”
About LIKEME App
Peter’s mission statement for LIKEME app is simple – “To improve interactions and communications between housemates”. To find out more about the market and how much demand there is for such an app, Peter conducted some user research. Peter found that 56% of people surveyed said living with housemates impacted on their wellbeing. This shows how important an app like LIKEME is to help people communicate better with their flatmates. Peter did not stop there, however and developed many creative additions to the app to make it as useful and helpful as possible. To see more of Peter’s project, check out his presentation here.
Chris James
About Chris
Chris has been designing and coding websites as a freelancer since 2006. However, he says he recently realized that being a web designer was “so 2008 – the tech industry has grown up and there is a whole new world of fancy job titles to choose from”. Chris took the decision to realign his career and focus on user experience. This is where UX Academy came in.
Why did you choose UX Academy?
“I wanted to learn a process for UX design. The UX Academy course has experienced tutors and was reasonably priced compared to other courses on the market.
What’s the most valuable lesson you have learnt at UX Academy?
I have learnt that validating your ideas is the key to good user experience. You need a solid basis of research to backup your thinking. (An example of this can be found on Chris’ portfolio below)
About Co-Plan
Mission Statement:
“To help the residents of a building improve their health and wellbeing.”
With his team, Chris set about discovering as much information as he could about the issues that residents in shared buildings face. They decided to focus on residents aged 20-35, living in flat/house share.
Following thier research, the team were ready to narrow their focus on the problem they wanted to solve:
“To improve household harmony in shared living environments through better communication.”
You can read more about how Chris and the team went about doing this on his portfolio here.
Co plan – Chris James, UX Academy Project from MobileUXLondon