A first pass at providing users with a template function.
Why use templates?
For many training providers there is great similarity between the courses they offer for different subjects. Users need an easy way to share information between these courses so they do not have to copy and paste content between them. Users also need to easily update all courses that share information, so that they all remain consistent, again without needing to copy and paste.
We’ve observed in user research that without the ability to share information users are likely to use copy and paste.
Template user research
To test templates we ran unmoderated remote research sessions with 4 training providers, and we visited 3 further providers.
We attempted many more remote sessions but some users did not complete the exercise and others could not record the session because of network firewalls or IT restrictions.
More about our research in confluence: Confluence
Unmoderated sessions
- University of Sunderland
- Surrey South Farnham
- Excalibur TSA
- University of Reading – 1
- University of Reading – 2
- University of Reading – 3
- University of Reading – 4
In-person moderated sessions
What goes into a template?
A template should have an identical structure to a course. eg About this course, course fees and length, and course requirements.
A course either uses a template wholesale or is completely custom. Our hypothesis is that a middle-ground, where a user can pick and choose which fields to copy or use, will be too complex a concept to explain and build, especially regarding ongoing maintenance and consistency.
Results
We found that users expect to be able to apply a template and then tweak it so they can add subject or course specific details. They also expect to be able to update a template and have that change apply to all courses using the template.
For example we saw that a Primary course is very similar to Primary with special educational needs, but the latter needs some extra supporting text.
Some users made their courses generic to use templates whereas others noted that they would not use templates without the ability to tweak – instead opting for the ‘Custom course’ every time. Users said they need ‘elements of templates’, or to ‘pick and choose’.
Without changes we risk making it easy for providers to not communicate the differences between their courses.
Follow-up design ticket: BATSA-459
Allowing multiple templates
Training providers can have similarity between courses in many ways. All of their PGCE courses might be the same, while their QTS all follow a different pattern. The same could be true for secondary vs primary. If a provider uses multiple accrediting providers then an accrediting provider template could work.
Results
Multiple templates were largely useful and understood by users.
Template limits and risks
Because a template includes all course fields it might be inappropriate to use them across certain courses. For example, by setting the fees on a template to those of a PGCE course (£9,000), this template should not then be applied to a QTS course – which costs less. There’s a risk that users could apply these templates wrongly and show incorrect information to users.
Results
We saw one user incorrectly apply a template, meaning a course showed the wrong fees. This may have been a symptom of the research as they did not spend too long checking their course information during the session.
Follow-up ticket to look at template validation, warnings and QA: BATSA-452
We saw 2 users misunderstand templates, they created subject specific course templates that could only ever apply to one course. However these users also did not fully engage with the exercise and did not complete the task set. We expected to see more users struggle with the concept of templates but were encouraged to see that the idea was largely well understood.
Templates in UCAS
There’s some concept of a template in the tool provided by UCAS. Users can select a training programme from which they can copy fields. Though once a copy has been made no subsequent edits are updated – users must resort to copy and paste again.
[UCAS documentation for ‘Entry profiles’](https://www.ucas.com/file/115116/download?token=Du-edwFy