D2L / 2014-2015
Learner Experience
Reframed Brightspace around the student and the learning material, producing D2L's highest-tested NPS and a concrete vision for a more engaging learner experience.
Design Highlights
Overview
Learner Experience was a personal vision project created during my time at D2L that reimagined the course viewing experience in Brightspace, putting students first with a content-first, mobile-first design. The goal was to make learning as engaging as watching a TV show or YouTube video, putting the content forward rather than burying it behind administrative interfaces.
Challenge
Most LMS experiences are built for teachers and administrators, not students. The student-facing experience in traditional learning platforms is often functional but uninspiring. Students accustomed to consumer-grade content experiences (streaming, social media, YouTube) found LMS interfaces dated and disengaging. The gap between how students consume content in their personal lives and how they experience educational content was widening.
Approach
Flipped the traditional LMS paradigm by designing a student-focused, content-first experience. Prioritized mobile-first design recognizing that students increasingly access course materials from their phones. Drew inspiration from entertainment and media consumption patterns, including rich media, visual storytelling, and fluid navigation, rather than traditional enterprise software patterns. Built a fully interactive prototype to test the vision with real students.
Solution
Created a fully interactive prototype featuring a content-first viewing experience that foregrounded course materials through rich media integration, story-like navigation, and modern visual design. The experience was designed to feel more like a curated content platform than a traditional LMS. Mobile-first responsive design ensured the experience was optimized for how students actually access their course materials.
Impact
High school students experienced course content through a focused, mobile-first flow that felt closer to the media products they used every day. In testing, the concept achieved the highest NPS of any D2L product and substantially outperformed the core Brightspace experience, which scored below 40. For D2L, the prototype made the business and experience case for treating learners as a primary audience rather than an extension of administrator workflows.
Key Learnings
The NPS gap between this prototype and the core product proved that designing for students, rather than treating the student experience as a byproduct of admin tools, changes outcomes entirely. Content-first design requires stripping away administrative chrome and letting the learning material be the experience. Drawing inspiration from entertainment platforms rather than enterprise software is the right frame for student-facing educational products.