How Academy Xi’s Part-Time UX Design course excelled my career & business.

What was it like? What did I learn? Why did I choose it over General Assembly?

Being a full-time Retoucher and freelance Web Designer, I needed a deep dive crash course on UX Design to up-skill myself in a short amount of time. I attended all the freebie General Assembly classes, did their One Day Bootcamps only to be left hungry for more!

After some research, I chose to do the Part-Time User Experience course at Academy Xi. Thanks to amazing Alexis, I managed to enrol the evening BEFORE the courses started in late October (I’ll come back to how this occured!).

What was it like?

The 10 week course was just right in terms of content and homework for me as I was juggling a full-time job and freelance work. It was quite easy to follow and you feel a sense of accomplishment after each week. With only 10–12 people in the class, you’ll get enough attention.

I felt it was it had a great mix of theory, videos and activities to apply the things we just learnt! Oh, snacks and water are provided =).

ABSOLUTELY LOVED ALL THE ACTIVITIES! They really made me think outside the box and made the classes more interactive!

My instructor Vera and mentor Siv were both very kind and helpful in guiding us in the right direction.

It was very clear my Web Design skills came in very handy when it came to UI and creative executions but it was the process of UX and the concept of Design Thinking, working collaboratively that drew me in the most!

What did I learn?

I learned and practiced the whole UX process in my personal project which includes:

1. Coming up with a problem
2. Different types of research
3. Conducting these research to validate problem
4. Collecting and draw meaning insight from research
5. Ideation and creation/ experimentation
6. Personas
7. Empathy mapping
8. Customer Journeys
9. Competitor analysis
10. User flows
11. MVP
12. Wireframing and Prototyping
13. User Testing
14. Presentation Skills

Really enjoyed the whole process and never thought research and user testing could be so much fun! With my Web Design background, I was able to do the branding and actually make my compost website go live for the presentation, something they weren’t expecting!

After the course is finished, the alumni Slack channels and free insightful events would keep you up to date with your peers and industry people! Though, I have to say, the new General Assembly campus in the city looks much nicer and its much bigger.

How did it excel my career?

I now apply my learnings in my freelance web design work as well as my current workplace. I am now able to validate my ideas and designs or question concepts and/or ideas from other people. Have also gotten a few freelance UX/UI gigs that I would have deemed unachievable before! (Thank you Vera for the recommendation!)

I’m always asking “why?” and have a habit of finding the root of the problems and then creating solutions for it.

At my full-time job, I’ve been dipping into the digital department (normally a Retoucher). I made microsite for a pitch (which we eventually won and got me Employee of the Month), made wireframes and prototypes for another pitch (which we also won). I am now starting to work literally next week on the UX/UI for a large financial sector client web redesign(whom I can’t name…yet) which was the one I worked on the wireframes and prototypes on previously. It certainly is so rewarding as it is, can't wait to work on this project!

Why Academy Xi and not General Assembly?

Customer service, Saturday classes (great when juggling full-time work and freelance!), cheaper price.

GA rang me once and asked me questions like a robot with not much care or passion, I was just ‘another student’ or ‘number’ to them. Told them I’m waiting for my work to get back to me about funding and they just said okay. Never heard back from them.

At Xi, I chatted online with Alexis briefly on their website chatbot. Alexis turned out to be a real person and not just a bot! She called me the next day, asked what I was after and how she could help. Alexis rang me various times, did not sound pushy at all and asked how she could assist me further. She was super understanding too!

Wrap up

Academy Xi’s Part Time UX Design course was perfect for me. It taught me what I needed within a good time frame at a decent price.

I met a lot passionate people along the way and hope to continuing building more connections with others!

Hope this has helped you in some way and thanks for reading!