Context
BU Spark! Project
January 2026 - May 2026
Contribution
Lead UI/UX Designer
Collaborators
Ibrahim Alburi - Technical Teammate
Abdul Hamdi - Technical Teammate
Tools
Figma
Adobe Illustrator
[1] Problem
Lack of student companionship
First-year and international students face a disproportionate challenge when arriving at a new institution — they lack an existing social network, may carry cultural or language barriers, and are dropped into a large, unfamiliar campus with little scaffolding for organic connection. The challenge isn't just loneliness; it's the activation energy required to find people and events when you don't already know where to look.
Our constraints were real: we lost half our team early in the project, which compressed our scope and forced stricter prioritization. We had to build something meaningfully useful without overextending our reduced capacity.
[2] Discovery Phase
Creating a customer profile
We identified two main audiences: New incoming Freshmen and Transfer students. Both audiences require support in settling the community as they are new to the campus.
[3] Research and Insights
User interviews
We conducted structured user interviews using a script, observing participants while they interacted with the app. Two rounds of interviews were tied to our two MVP milestones.
[4] Process & Design Development
Design Decisions
Our goal is to help students on campus get familiar with campus community by providing nearby ongoing activities that can be filtered based on interests and popularities for students to be proactive.
Branding
Nearygle - Mascot and logo inspired by golden eagle as we want our app to be easy and recognizable. Eagles are known to be very aware of their surroundings
[5] Scope and structure
Low-fidelity frames
We started designing the skeleton of our product with three main changes: Discover, Profile, and Saved pages.
[6] Final Solution
Final Output
Designed to type in your personal interests when signing in for AI to filter out and show events based on your interests on the map.
Designed in detail to view the attendees of the event the user registers
Designed to save your event you see on the map. Different icons differentiates the type of events on the map.
Allowing user to user interaction of friends you see on the map while having the ability to host your public or private event.
At the end of the Spark! Innovation Program, our team presented Sanvia on Demo Day to the Boston University Faculty for Computing & Data Sciences with a presentation and on-display Eposters.
E-Poster
[7] Outcomes & Reflections
What worked well was the feedback loop between interviews and iteration. Each round of user testing gave us a clear, actionable signal — and because we responded to it directly in the next build, users could see their feedback reflected. That builds trust in the process.
What didn't work as smoothly was the early team disruption. Losing half the team created a rough start and forced scope decisions we hadn't planned for. In hindsight, earlier alignment on a leaner MVP would have cushioned that more.
The most durable lesson was about the value of design-first development. Having a visual reference before writing any code kept the product consistent and gave everyone a shared target. Without that, especially on a reduced team, it's easy for features to drift in style and feel. Design is not a nice-to-have at the start — it's the mechanism by which a team maintains coherence when bandwidth is tight.
©2026
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