TIMELINE

Sep 2025 - Dec 2025

TEAM

Case study w/ Charles Zhang

Tech@NYU Dev Team

ROLE

Designer & Frontend Developer

SKILLS

Figma, Typescript, Next.js, Convex

How can NYU students search courses and plan their degree more efficiently?

Target Audience: NYU Students.

PROBLEMS

The current Albert system has four key pain points that consistently frustrate students during registration.

Messy UI/UX

Cluttered and outdated — too many clicks, dense text with no visual hierarchy, and pop-up modals that hinder scanning.

Hard to Search & Find Courses

15+ filter dropdowns return plain text lists with no way to compare sections, professors, or timings side by side.

No Course Planning Support

No built-in way to track degree requirements or see what courses still need to be completed.

Can’t Preview Calendar

No calendar preview before committing — students can’t spot conflicts or build a balanced schedule without registering first.

SOLUTION

Smart Course Search

Search and filter courses by subject, professor, time, and credits — all in one clean interface. No more clicking through endless dropdowns.

Side-by-Side Comparison

Compare multiple sections of the same course — professor ratings, times, seat availability — without ever leaving the page.

Calendar Preview

See your weekly schedule update in real time as you add courses. Spot conflicts and build a balanced schedule before you commit to anything.

Degree Planner

Track completed requirements, see what's left, and map out upcoming semesters — so you always know exactly where you stand on your degree.

FIGMA PROTOTYPE

USER RESEARCH

I interviewed 20+ NYU students to understand how they really feel about the course selection system.

I have to click through so many pages just to find one course. The interface feels like it was built in 2005 and never touched since.

— Junior, CAS

There's no good way to compare two sections of the same class. I have to open like five tabs and flip back and forth.

— Sophomore, Stern

I genuinely don't know if I'm on track to graduate. Albert gives me a checklist but I still have to manually figure it out every semester.

— Senior, Tandon

I accidentally enrolled in two classes that overlap because there's no calendar preview. I didn't find out until the first week of class.

— Junior, Gallatin

Market Research

I mapped where the experience breaks down by comparing Albert against student needs and competitor tools.

Existing Alternative — Einstein

Einstein is a student-built tool offering a cleaner course list and timetable builder, but it still falls short in key ways:

✓ What Works

Cleaner Than Albert

More readable course list with less visual noise than the original Albert interface.

All Course Info in One Place

Course details, times, professor, and credits are all visible without navigating away — easy to scan and compare.

Built-in Timetable Builder

Students can preview their weekly schedule before committing — a useful step the original Albert lacks entirely.

✗ Issues

Visually Overwhelming

Bright, saturated course cards with no clear logic create a loud patchwork that makes scanning harder, not easier.

Hard to Navigate

Small, unlabelled school filter icons and no clear hierarchy make it hard to move from search to selecting and adding a course.

Calendar Feature is Hard to Use

No conflict or credit-load feedback. Switching between Favorites and numbered Schedules is unintuitive and easy to lose track of.

Existing Alternative — Paper (Northwestern)

Paper is a course planning tool used at Northwestern that introduces smart multi-year planning and a fluid schedule builder — but its interface works against its own strengths:

✓ What Works

Smart 4-Year Plan

Drag-and-drop courses into a year-by-year grid makes long-term degree planning intuitive and visual — a feature missing from most course tools.

Course-to-Schedule Flow

Searching a course and adding it directly into a live calendar preview is seamless — students can spot conflicts before committing.