Lecture halls are one of the most important facilities at UC Berkeley. Lecture halls are where students learn materials, engage with the professor and other students, and take exams. Lecture halls are therefore a crucial factor in providing the very best learning environment to students. However, not all lecture halls are perfect and thus our team conducted a series of surveys to grasp what students at Cal thought were missing from our lecture halls. Through a number of user research, brainstorms, and trials and errors, I present an idea that would improve students' experience with lecture halls here at Cal. 

After analyzing 12 user research surveys, my team and I came down to three key factors students identified as influencing their learning experience in lecture halls.

#1 Personal Space

Students should have adequate amount of personal space to feel comfortable.

#2 Learning Environment

Students should be able to easily hear and see the professor and his/her lecture and be free from other distractions. 

#3 Convenience 

Students should be able to maneuver around and exit the lecture hall with ease. 

One of the main problems students encountered was not being able to hear the professor or other students' questions/comments very well. While there are many other problems students identified, I decided to focus on one and come up with a viable solution that can be easily adopted by the school. 

While there are "easy" solutions such as increasing the volume of the speaker's microphone, this is not always a viable options. In some lecture halls, the speakers don't really work well and it's difficult for students to hear the speaker even if the volume is quite loud. In other cases, it could be difficult for some students at the back to hear even if others in the front can. Some students, in addition, do not speak out that they cannot hear well during lecture. 

In any case, one solution quickly came up to my mind: students being able to use earplugs in class so that they can control the volume of the speaker on their own.

Low-Fidelity Prototyping:

initially, I thought that having one earphone (not two pairs) connected to the desk/chair would be the most viable solution. This way, students can hear the professor both through their earplug as well as without. Discussions with a partner allowed me to see a way I could improve this idea: providing a pair of earplugs and incorporating a microphone function to the earplugs. This is mainly for students asking questions, answering questions, or commenting on something during lecture. 

Using such feedback, I came up with a better solution: to equip all desks/chairs with ports that people can connect their own earphones to. This is to prevent the individual earphones that are already connected to the desks/chairs from being ruined and also for sanitary reasons. If possible, it would also be great for the individual chairs/desks to be equipped with a bluetooth technique so that other types of earphones such as earpods can work. Also, this can allow students to use the microphone function of their earphones/headphones to speak. To make sure that no other noises are made except for the professor during lecture, the professor would be able to control when students can use their microphones or not.

High-Fidelity Prototype:

Using Autodesk Fusion 360, I created a model chair (though not refined) that includes the holes for the earphones. There would be technology hidden inside the armrests so that the connected earphones and/or earpods/headphones could be controlled by the professor. The professor would be able to turn on microphone functions so that students can speak when they’re allowed to.