Hats & Ladders Partners with Community of Unity Youth to Rapid Prototype New NSF-Funded Career Exploration App

New York City – On May 30, Hats & Ladders and Community of Unity wrapped up a 6-month long collaboration. 20 students from 5 different high schools that offer the Community of Unity Social Emotional Learning volunteered to meet with the Hats & Ladders product development team every 3 weeks.  

During these hands-on sessions, students gained a first-hand understanding of an iterative, user-centered design process. After contributing to a discovery discussion about why people struggle to find the right career, students worked in small groups to test and critique early design concepts and paper prototypes for the new career exploration app.  They continued to play-test the app as it was developing, providing the opportunity for best-practice rapid prototyping and seeing how their feedback was used to continuously improve the app.

“At Hats & Ladders, we believe all youth should have access to meaningful, individualized career exploration.  The app won’t replace a coach, counselor, mentor or educator. That’s not our goal. The app serves as a support to youth to get to know themselves better, explore a wide range of careers and take a few risks by climbing some ladders that are just right for them.” says Juliette Adams, VP of strategy.  Community of Unity’s motto is “Make Good Choices”. The Hats & Ladders app is designed to let youth discover the options they have online and in the community. The partnership made sense from the beginning.

Eric Komoroff, Executive Director of Community of Unity, sees value in the app itself, and in Hats & Ladders high touch approach to user-centered design.  “An essential piece of our program is providing kids with Opportunities that broaden and deepen their view of the world and their relationship to it. Hats and Ladders, the app and the people, did that in such meaningful ways.”

“The Community of Unity kids were amazing.  First of all, they volunteered to so this. It was a big commitment on their part.  Community of Unity’s curriculum is anchored around Self-Awareness, Self-Esteem, Responsibility, Integrity, Sense of Humor, Empathy and Focus.  These kids came equipped with those skills at each of the sessions and really helped us in our product development approach.” added Juliette Adams.

Hats & Ladders and Community of Unity look forward to continuing their partnership in the future.

Hats & Ladders Inc., is developing its groundbreaking mobile career exploration platform, Hats & Ladders. The app-based tool will help youth across the country explore careers that fit their interests and strengths and connect to digital resources and real-world projects that can assist them in developing their skills and pursuing those careers.  More info at www.hatsandladders.com.

Since 2001, Community of Unity has directly impacted NYC’s most under-served urban youth through our holistic, uniquely “high-touch”, long term, peer- and relationship-driven, social-emotional learning programs, and has indirectly impacted countless others via professional development programs for educators, counselors, social workers, families, school administrators and school networks. More info at http://communityofunity.org/