Eassay is an AI app that helps teachers grade essays faster and more efficiently. This is our submission for the Impact Hackathon 2021 for Education hosted by Impact Hub Manila where our team won 1st Runner Up.
MY KEY ROLE
UI Designer
UX Designer
Logo & Brand Designer
Slide Deck & Pitch Video
SUPPORT
UX Copywriter
UX Researcher
PRODUCT TYPE
Mobile App Prototype
DURATION
3 Days
27 May 2021 – 29 May 2021
CLIENT
Hackathon Project for Impact Hackathon 5G Education
PROJECT TEAM
Ardy Ubanos
Hacker, Developer
Madonna Lea
Hustler, Entrepreneur
Kate Tacastacas
Hipster, Designer
Aldrich Alvarez
Hacker, Developer
Ernestine Villafuerte
Hacker, Developer
ABOUT THE PROJECT
Eassay is the result of a three-day virtual hackathon conducted remotely by a group of strangers from the Philippines. Our team came together when our leader, Ardy Ubanos posted on the Impact Hackathon FB Group that he was looking for teammates. Discord was chosen as our main communication platform because of it’s easy creation of topic-based channels and reliable voice and video features all for free to use. Figma was utilized to create the prototype, Canva was used to create the PowerPoint presentation and pitch video, and Github was used to upload the code.
BRIEF OVERVIEW OF IMPACT HACKATHON
Impact 2050 is a multi-year program designed to equip, enable, and empower innovative individuals who want to affect change through technology. Impact Hub Manila will conduct seven themed hackathons throughout the duration of 2021. These are Education, Climate Change, Good Governance, Food & Agriculture, Health, Indigenous People, and Smart Cities.
The Impact Hackathon is a 3-day virtual code fest that seeks to find the most innovative solution that aims to address the challenge statements provided by our vertical partners. Due to the COVID19 pandemic, this year’s hackathon was conducted virtually.
HOW THE TEAM WAS FORMED
I found this fb post very late. It was May 26 and the following day was already the start of the hackathon. During that time, there was only 1 person who’s looking for teammates and that was our leader, Ardy Ubanos. I messaged him and a discord group was created. We had a brief meeting at nighttime and Ardy introduced us to the SCAMPER method. As you can see from below, these are the ideas and solutions we came up regarding distance learning problems.
CONCEPTUALIZATION
How might we develop a mobile-based platform that automatically checks and grades assessment modules?
It was opening night and they showed us four problems to work with. After a lot of meetings with the team and mentors, we chose problem statement 3.
They were a lot of ideas before our team finalized on ‘essay assessment automation’. These are some ideas:
- Gamified learning to increase engagement and attentiveness similar to Quizizz and Kahoot.
- Students use a lot of platforms during online class and it’s getting harder to keep track. Hoping to create a unified platform where teachers can easily track their students.
DESIGN SYSTEM
I created a design system and branding guidelines for ED Tech team and Eassay app. Then, I added the elements designed in the Eassay app.
THE PROBLEM
Teachers are tired and burdened. Reading essays are fun and insightful but for the most part, essays are long and complicated.
According to research, it takes 3 hours just to assess an essay. Due to the COVID 19 Pandemic and the sudden switch to distance learning, it now takes longer to assess essays.
A teacher progressing their workload on their own is exhausting, time-consuming, and inefficient.
THE SOLUTION
Easy and essay never comes hand-in-hand. Writing essays requires great effort, but what about checking them? Reading, examining, and grading essays takes a long time but what if it can be done in mere seconds?
Introducing Eassay where essay assessment automation is possible.
APP INTERFACE
Eassay can grade essays faster and efficiently with features like context checking and context-grammar checking. An AI would check the comprehension from certain keywords that have been extracted via images and run it to a grammar checker.
TARGET MARKET
The target market for Eassay are schools and teachers. On the other hand, the possible markets are corporate, publishing companies, and recruitment agencies.
FUTURE PLAN
The potential of Eassay is limitless in the scale of paper assessment automation. Outside of essays lies paper documents that need to be assessed. As long as there is a paper to assess, check, or grade, Eassay remains relevant.
NEXT STEPS
We would still innovate and improve on our product. The next steps for our team could be to conduct further research and user testing to improve and enhance our product and user experience. The team should also conduct market research and come up with a viable marketing strategy so that we could successfully launch our product to the global market.
PRESS RELEASES
Impact Hackathon 5G Education Top 3 Teams – May 2021
Impact Hackathon 5G Education Winners – May 2021
