Course Hero (2024–2025) · Staff Product Designer
Designed Study Tools and Study Boards, AI products that turned Course Hero from one-off answers into a semester-long study companion. Study Boards drove a 16% increase in weekly active users.
The user problem
Students struggle to turn their course content into prep material before tests and exams.
Preparing for exams was the biggest unmet need, and nothing in Course Hero helped. 57% of students prepared in study groups and 47% turned to other online study tools like Quizlet and Anki.
The business problem
AI chat was draining the search traffic Course Hero was built on.
1.8 million unique visitors a day came for an answer and left. As students moved to AI chat, the top of that funnel dropped. Study Boards was the stickiness bet: a reason to come back, measured in weekly active users.
Painted-door tests showed desire
Students clicked into study material created from their own course.
We put real entry points in the live product and measured click-through before building anything. Material tied to the student's own course beat generic library content.
A KANO survey set priorities
Practice questions and flashcards were the must-haves.
We surveyed students on common study features, from flashcard generation to AI "teach me" explanations, to separate must-haves from delighters. The top two are built into every topic.
A course-level workspace that builds itself from the assignments, labs, tests and exams already on file. Every board comes with a study guide, flashcards, practice questions, a timed mock test and a cram sheet.
It tracks what a student knows and how ready they are, and suggests what to study next. Giving it a home also meant a redesigned course-add flow and a dashboard organized around active courses.
Six design patterns shaped how the AI behaves in Study Boards. Each one traces back to something students told us, and each one cost us something.
Pattern 1
Setup takes about two minutes. The board suggests topics from the course's peer uploads, each with its source count, and students can add their own material.
Pattern 2
Every study guide section has numbered citations that jump to the peer upload behind it. A sources panel lists everything in use, and students can exclude any document from their own board.
Pattern 3
The board shows one number, defined in plain words beside it: 100% means every flashcard is marked Know and every practice question is right. Add an exam date and it becomes a daily aim.
Pattern 4
The board always offers one primary next step and one alternative: flashcards on day one, later your weakest topic or the questions you missed. Shaky sections get a Revisit tag.
Pattern 5
After a mock test or session, students see each topic before and after, plus the move in overall readiness, with a button to start on the weakest.
16%
increase in weekly active users after Study Boards launched
Measured as the eight weeks before launch against the eight weeks after, across courses with a Study Board. No other major acquisition launch shipped in that window.
Why that number mattered: weekly active users show whether students come back on purpose. That was the answer to a funnel losing its search traffic to AI chat: a study habit that doesn't depend on a Google search.
This is the working prototype, running live. Step through a student's week below, or click around it yourself.
Illustrative content: an ECON 101 board built from 200 placeholder peer uploads. Built with Claude from my Figma designs.
The prototype is built for a desktop screen. Open it on a laptop for the full experience.
Open the prototype ↗Get in Touch
I'm currently open to new opportunities. If you're looking for a Staff Product Designer who brings clarity to complex problems, let's talk.