safespace
child abuse and neglect prevention
The mission behind Safespace is to provide a universal online platform to help prevent the neglect and abuse of adolescents by providing resources and reporting. Children interact with their teachers more than their parents, so I felt that attacking abuse and neglect by training educators and students would be the best approach.
role
UX Researcher
Information Architect
UI Designer
stakeholders
Childwelfare.gov
Educators
Victims
insight .01
91%
91% of teachers and staff were familiar with child abuse and/ or neglect warning signs.
insight .02
65%
Nearly 2/3 of participants have suspected a child maybe neglected and/or abused.
insight .03
69%
69% of participants responded “yes” to reporting possible abuse or neglect cases.
insight .04
24%
When asked what training or resource they believed to would help them better identify signs a majority of 24% responded with more cohesive training such as: videos, modules, and more information.
insight .05
6
More participants responded “none of the above” to “If there are any, what factors might prevent you from reporting a possible abuse case?”
“In fear that the report wouldn’t be kept anonymous.
“Someone else already reported it”
“To short of interactions to notice anything”
research
The goal of this survey was to get an idea of what kind of training teachers are receiving, as well as, to understand their level of knowledge on abuse. Results showed that educators were mostly familiar with the signs of abuse but low in their confidence to report a case due to a lack of cohesive training
information architecture
After gathering requirements from users, I created my proposed information architecture. First, I provided users with a feature for children and adults to report abuse. All submissions must include evidence required by CPS, and users who submit will always be anonymous.
The tool has two tabs, resources and academy, and a report button. The resources tab will provide users with the tools and information, such as a blog and forum, to learn and be a part of a community of other survivors, advocates, and teachers. Academy is the learning module feature that schools can use to train and schedule refreshers for teachers and staff while also educating students in understanding what abuse is and what treatment is neglectful or abusive.
navigate to the blog page
75%
75% of users navigated to the blog page correctly. 25% navigated incorrectly.
find the learning module for students
100%
All users navigated correctly to the student modules
report an abuse case for a child
75%
75% of users navigated correctly to the report abuse page. 25% navigated incorrectly to “on behalf”
treejack test
wireframes
After building and prototyping my lo-fi mockups I tested our 3 users to learn where I can improve and what features best suit the users needs.
test results
tasks:
-
You are a teacher and you want to report an abuse case on the behalf of a student
-
Navigate to the blog page and read an article
-
Make a post on the forum page
-
You are a student looking to learn more about what neglect and abuse looks like so you start the learn module
-
You are looking to find out about other people’s experience with child abuse so you open a forum entry
who is the participant?
3 participants
Teachers and student
what was learned?
validated:
Users were able to locate the reporting system and how to report
The forum was accessible and easy to navigate
Learn module was intuitive.
Posting to the forum was easy to find
did not validate:
Blog layout was a little confusing. Boxes don’t look like blog articles
safespace
This case study aims to create a platform to make social change. Child abuse and neglect is a severe problem in the US that affects children and our future adults.
In my research, I discovered that teachers report abuse cases more than any other party in child abuse and neglect at 21%. Since teachers make the majority of reports, educators must be well versed in recognizing the signs of neglect and abuse. Safespace is a tool for schools to educate both students and teachers on child abuse with learning modules for both users. My system also includes a blog and community forum for users to further their knowledge and join a safe community of other advocates, survivors, and teachers.
next steps
For the following steps, I plan to develop the learning modules further and community feature for users to get the best experience possible, as well as add a resource section for essential links and resources. Improvements to be made are tweaks to the blog layout to enhance navigation. Users had a bit of trouble going back to previous lessons and adding descriptions to the entry points of the learning modules.
