by Janet Leach (Guest blogger)

Doing something for the greater good without any expected monetary compensation?! That is hard to find nowadays. Lindsey Davis, Master’s student at UH Manoa, did just that! She’s a volunteer at a museum on Schofield Barracks and saw a need that the museum’s paper tour needed to be pumped up to appeal to the audience that visited. She took into account that about 16,000 soldiers are on the base, and although it is a transient population, her mobile app would encourage soldiers to interact with their community by educating them about artifacts around the base. The museum has a variety of memorabilia and her app adds in the images, audio descriptions, trivia questions, and a map gps! She discussed the site’s usability by focusing on its efficiency, learnability, and effectiveness. It was interesting to her the improvements she made from the usability study such as making the app have more desirable colors and icons. I thought it was great her app appeals to both auditory and visual learners.

The app she used to build, called Izi, is such a great resource! Her presentation inspired me to think about making a “tour” app for the new students that come into the middle school I teach at. We have a transition center designated to all our new students because we have such a high turnover of students, since it is a military school. Lindsey mentioned that the app is free for educational institutions so it something that I really want to look into! I was happy to watch her presentation because it inspired me 🙂

About the Featured Student Presenter’s Project

Description of Lindseyʻs project:

“Walk Schofield is an app-based solution to foster community awareness and education among Soldiers and military families based at Schofield Barracks, an Army installation on the island of Oahu.”

Why she chose the topic for her project:

“As a military spouse with a background in museum studies and educational design, this project reflects my personal and professional dedication to facilitating community engagement and public service among service members and their families.”

Social Media Information:

LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/davislindseyk