Sspace

Created by Christina Pollais '16, Sasha Levy '15, and Steffi Lee '15

The Problem

How safe do you feel when you go out at night? Wellesley College students face many unwritten dangers when they step out of the "Bubble". Our team has conceptualized an app that instills a higher sense of safety and security in Wellesley students as they navigate parties, bars, and other social establishments that they may have little information about. Currently, the only way they receive informed opinions about safety in these establishments is through informal face-to-face conversations.However, the distribution of this information is neither equal nor centralized, and in an increasingly online society, this method is becoming ineffective. SafeNight attempts to aggregate educated, helpful, and available information on the safety levels in social spaces across Boston on one simple online platform. This is a safe space.

User, Task, and Domain Analysis

User Analysis

We interviewed several Wellesley students ranging from First-year to senior class status. We asked the following interview questions:
  1. Describe your process in finding a place to go out off campus on the weekend.
  2. How much does safety factor into your decision when choosing where to go?
  3. Do you ever ask friends or classmates about places they go? how much does this affect your decision?
  4. describe your use of social media in finding weekend activities?
  5. Would you feel comfortable sharing how safe you felt at a location with other wellesley students?
Here are some interview summaries

User #1: 2017, Claflin, goes out about once per 2 weeks, International Student

  1. Describe your process in finding a place to go out off campus on the weekend.
    2. I use three main ways. First, I ask friends about what is going on in Boston and what parties are happening. If none of my friends know of anything good, I look up events on social media (Facebook) and see if I can find a nice party. If there is still nothing, I alook at the site: “http://www.thebostoncalendar.com/” and scroll through it until I find a place that looks good. After finding a few good places, I look through the reviews and try to decide which one will be the best to go to.

  2. How much does safety factor into your decision of where to go?
    3. Not much (about 20%) since there is no way to really find out about which places are safe. However, if there was a way to know how safe a place is, it would definitely affect my decision to a specific location.

  3. Do you ever ask friends/ classmates about places they go? how much does this affect your decision?
    4. Yes, I do and it greatly affects my decision. If a close friend that I trust recommends a place, I will probably go there.

  4. Describe your use of social media in finding weekend activities.
    5. If my friends do not know about any fun weekend activities, I mostly use social media to find one.

  5. Would you feel comfortable sharing how safe you felt at a location with other wellesley students?
    6. Sure, if I could do so in an anonymous manner that could help others out.

User #2: 2018, Severance, goes out about once per month

  1. Describe your process in finding a place to go out off campus on the weekend.
    2. I go to my Facebook Events and see what I am invited to. Then, I ask my friends which party they think would be the best one to go to.

  2. How much does safety factor into your decision of where to go?
    3. Quite a bit but since most of my friends are also first years, it is hard to know which places are safe and which are not.

  3. Do you ever ask friends/ classmates about places they go? how much does this affect your decision?
    4. Yes. After an initial sweep through my Facebook Events, I essentially decide based on which party my friends recommend. However, as mentioned above, most of my friends have not gone to many places since we are all first years. It was especially difficult to get recommendations during my first semester but as we get older, it is easier.

  4. Describe your use of social media in finding weekend activities.
    5. As stated above, I mostly rely on social media (Facebook) to find a weekend activity.

  5. Would you feel comfortable sharing how safe you felt at a location with other wellesley students?
    6. Yes!

User #3: 2015, Tower, goes out at least once per week

  1. Describe your process in finding a place to go out off campus on the weekend.
    2. I usually text some of my friends at Wellesley and see what they’re doing, if no one’s doing something I like here then I would text my friends at MIT or Harvard. If I wasn’t trying to go to a frat party though I would just Google/Yelp and find a high rated bar.

  2. How much does safety factor into your decision of where to go?
    3. It was more of a factor as a younger student, I feel like I know where to go and where not to go now as a Senior, but if there’s a place I’ve never been before I definitely ask around before going, especially if I’m not going with a group of close friends.

  3. Do you ever ask friends/ classmates about places they go? how much does this affect your decision?
    4. I always ask friends about where they go! Classmates not as much because I feel like I go out more than the average Wellesley student so there’s not that much they can offer that I don’t already know. What my friends say though highly affects my decision.

  4. Describe your use of social media in finding weekend activities.
    5. For me, if there’s an event that I’ve been invited to on Facebook or that I see shared a lot I’m less likely to go to it. I always look at how many people are confirmed going and if it’s a ton then it’s probably going to be a wild party that as a senior I’m not interested in going to. But people do still use Facebook for closed events, which affects my decision more.

  5. Would you feel comfortable sharing how safe you felt at a location with other wellesley students?
    6. I already share what I know with the younger students on my hall; I’d love a more streamlined way of sharing this information that has taken me four long years to gather!
By examining interviews with Wellesley students of varying grade levels, we developed the four user personas that paint a picture of our user audience:

User Class 1: Novice
Yasmin is a first year at Wellesley College. She has never been to a college party before and is eager to go out the first weekend the Senate bus is running! The problem is she doesn’t know where she should go- the only things to guide her are Facebook events and spam left by fraternities on the dining hall tables. She doesn’t feel comfortable showing up to a party where she doesn’t know anyone, but she doesn’t have any upperclass students she feels like she can reach out to for advice either. She logs on to SafeNight on a Friday night to see what frats are safe so she can choose one to go out.		 User Class 2: Experienced
Alexa is a senior studying Theater. She has been to many parties in boston and knows her way around the area’s nightlife very well. She learns about party events from friends at both Wellesley and the Boston area colleges. Alexa isn’t naive, she knows that not every place is going to be as welcoming or safe as Wellesley is. She is excited to share her knowledge with other Wellesley students; she wants them to have a safe but fun time. She logs on to SafeNight and posts comments/rating for particular establishments.
User Class 3: Passive
Hannah is a second semester sophomore at Wellesley, studying Political Science. She has a group of friends who she hangs out with at MIT and they often invite her to parties. Like Susan, she agrees that there are some spaces at MIT that aren’t extremely safe. She wants to share her opinions with other students, but doesn’t know all the details about any particular place to make a specific comment. She browses SafeNight and gives ratings which she agrees with a thumbs up and those she doesn’t agree with a thumbs down.		 User Class 4: Admin
Michelle works for SafeNight and has gone through all the necessary checks to become an administrator for Wellesley. She accesses the application every night to go through the comments that have been made that day. If any comment has more than 4 thumbs down it is automatically flagged for her review and taken off of the boards until she has done so. Users can also report specific comments, which Michelle also reviews.

Task Analysis

User Tasks
  1. Create a User Account
  2. Find a place to go
  3. Comment/Rate a place
  4. Upvote/Downvote a comment
  5. Create a new location
Admin Tasks
  1. Delete a comment
  2. Delete a location
Hierarchal Task Diagram


Domain Analysis