Students will launch the community improvement project by examining authentic local issues, hearing stakeholder perspectives, practicing evidence-based problem framing, and recording first progress notes that will guide later research, design, and revision.

Students will gather direct user evidence from community members, test assumptions against observations and source notes, organize findings into an empathy artifact, and turn that evidence into a focused design brief with a progress-monitoring plan for the next phase.

Students will turn their research and problem statements into multiple solution concepts, build and test low-fidelity prototypes with users, and document two rounds of revision using feedback notes, progress journals, and before-and-after evidence.

Students will refine a community improvement prototype or action plan using evidence from earlier testing, validate it with a new or representative user, and prepare a stakeholder-facing portfolio presentation that shows research, revisions, progress tracking, and persuasive next steps.

Students will present their community improvement proposals, tested prototypes, progress charts, portfolio evidence, and newspaper-style articles to an authentic audience, gather final stakeholder feedback, and document how their thinking, collaboration, and leadership changed across the project.