Bear Necessities is a non-profit pediatric cancer organization founded in late 1992 by Kathleen A. Casey. For 26 years, they’ve focused on helping children and their families receive bear hugs, fund research for pediatric cancer, and spread awareness of pediatric cancer through various fundraising events. Today, Bear Necessities operates two unique programs: Bear Hugs and Bear Discoveries.
Project Objectives
Bear Necessities wants to focus on getting more attention to their Bear Hugs program and having more families involved with them even after bear hugs are received.
• Help prospective applicants better understand the Bear Hug program and Bear Necessities organization:
Suggestions for the improvement:
• Look for ways to clarify/simplify the Bear Hugs program to prospective families
• In-depth experience for Bear Hugs program (e.g. creating a separate website, adding more stories, interactions, etc); making it stand on its own
• Identity for Bear Hugs; how to create own unique experience for BN
Develop a way to showcase:
• Former bear hug recipients’ stories that benefited from research partially funded by Bear Necessities
• Families that continue to fundraise for the Bear Necessities organization after their Bear Hug is complete
• Improve the Bear Hug application process to ensure that Bear Necessities receives all of the information required to move forward with the family:
• Improve the current referral form by ensuring all required information is captured; simplify, edit (e.g., remove repetitive/unnecessary information, add essential information), make the form easy to understand
• Ensure that the referral form is also mobile-accessible. The current form is supposedly unusable on mobile
• Find a way to immediately connect families with further information about the Bear Hug program and the Bear Necessities organization after their application has been successfully completed and submitted
Audience
Our focus is on pediatric cancer patients ranging from 0 to 19 years old and their immediate families, and qualified families who would be interested in/benefit from Bear Necessities.
Research Framework
Research Process
Research Process
Research Process
Research Process
Research Process
Research Process
Research Process
Research Process
What We Learned
• Bear Hugs experiences were positively viewed by families
• Families weren’t too familiar with their brand and mission
• Lack of face-to-face communication between families and organization:
• No personal touch to exchanges (e.g., parent wanted to meet/see who they were talking to, even virtually)
• Lack of engagement from families after receiving Bear Hug:
• Keep up via Facebook, e-newsletters, and family events, but didn’t know where to start to get involved (e.g., start volunteering/fundraising on own)
Deliverables
Current Referral Form
Current Referral Form_p1
Current Referral Form_p2
Current Referral Form_p3
Current Referral Form_p4
Current Referral Form_p5
Issues of Current Referral Form
• Mandatory information was either not marked or included
• Misplaced questions
Redesigned Referral Form
What We Changed:
• Mandatory fields:
• Financial support, patient interests, etc
• Wording Changes:
• E.g., Diagnosis Status > Treatment Stage
• Field Additions:
• Info on family situation, more about siblings
• Personable, context
• Miscellaneous:
• Organization for better flow
Current Hospital Flyer
Issues of Current Hospital Flyer
• Text-heavy
• Logo and contact information are not visibly obvious
• Title block and “Did you know…?” section takes up a lot of space
• Facts aren’t helpful to families who already know about cancer
• No call-to-actions (i.e., social medial)
Redesigned Bear Hugs Flyer
What we changed:
• Mission
• Will lead to main website and social medias
• Define a Bear Hug
• Featured Stories; visuals
• Impact of Bear Hug:
• How many kids have been helped so far and how many BH have been given
• Testimonials from kids/families
• Contact info
Low-fi Bear Hug Flyer
Flyer Design 1
Flyer Design 2
Mid-fi Bear Hug Flyer
Flyer Design 1
Flyer Design 2
Brochure Design External Panel
Brochure Design Internal Panel
Finalized Bear Hug Flyer
Flyer Design 1
Flyer Design 2
Brochure Design External Panel
Brochure Design Internal Panel
Current Bear Hugs Page
Current Issues of Current Bear Hugs Page
• Single, busy page
• Text heavy (e.g., sidebar, Q&A below video)
• Requires a lot of scrolling
• Lack of visuals, impact
• Unused chunk of white space
• No contact info for volunteers/BN staff who regularly contact the families
Redesigned Bear Hugs Page
• Define a Bear Hug
• Focus on emotional appeal (stories)
• Communicate Impact
• Calling on site visitors to get involved
• Aligning navigation with the rest of the site
Low-fi Bear Hugs Page
Webpage Design 1
Webpage Design 2
Webpage Design 3.1
Webpage Design 3.2
Webpage Design 3.3
Mid-fi Bear Hugs Page
Define Bear Hugs
Featured Stories
Impact of Bear Hugs
Get Involved
Finalized Bear Hugs Page
Define Bear Hugs
Featured Stories
Featured Stories
Featured Stories
Featured Stories
Featured Stories
Impact of Bear Hugs
Get Involved
Bear Hugs Page Demo
Future Directions
• Usability & IA testing of Bear Hugs website: Free listing, card sorting, Treejack test, etc.
• Analyze the results for the future design iterations (Bear Hugs webpage redesign)
Tools
• Pen and paper - Sketching for prototypes
• Adobe XD - Team collaboration and Bear Hugs page demo
• Adobe Illustrator - Logo and graphics
• Adobe InDesign - Bear Hugs flyers
• Miro - Team collaboration for affinity diagram and user journey map
• Powerpoint - Final Presentation to client
• Excel - Referral Form
• Google Doc. - Note taking during client and team meeting
• Google Drive - Team collaboration
Contributions
Bear Necessities: Courtney Krupa, Amy LeMay
Teammates: Frauline Agarin, Mitchell Smith and Yuchen Guo
Interviewees: Pazit (mom) to Ethan 16 year old teen battling lymphoma, Trisha (mom) to Caden 5 year old boy battling leukemia ALL, and Jason (dad) to Regan 2.5 years old girl battling leukemia ALL
