gsLearn: Creating a scalable online learning service 

Client/Company/Project type: Girl Scouts of the USA

Project date: 2017-2019

My role. Instructional Designer. Service Designer. Business Analyst for technical implementation

About this Project: This project encompassed two main goals: 1- to deliver a reliable, on-demand digital learning service to 200- 750,000 adult volunteers around the world and 2 – design a standardized, foundational adult-level online curriculum for all Girl Scout leaders across 113 councils. 

The challenge. The first challenge was figuring out a scalable solution that would fit 112 unique entities within the enterprise. Each council operates as its own business unit (C-suite, budgeting, ets). Historically there was some distrust between national and the local councils that I had to overcome. Another challenge was learning about all the ways in which councils had been addressing the ‘learning problem’ on their own and honouring the practices which worked well for their local council. Our major KPI for this project was Volunteer Troop Leader retention  – how can troop leaders be better supported and educated at the time of their onboarding and be provided professional development resources throughout their time as a volunteer

Solution. Solving a learning need for 750k+ learners had many milestones involved.

• Standarized foundational training: With a group of 25 council-level subject matter experts, I created several ‘learning curriculum domains.’ Each group was focused on a co-creating a  specific foundational course. Collectively, these courses were in a progression was called the ‘Successful Leader Learning Series’ and would be required for all new troop leaders to receive across GSUSA. 

• Enterprise online learning platform

• Council training and outreach

Results: Began rolling out to councils in a phased approach, over a two-year period. Within one year of partial implementation, Troop Leader satisfaction increases by 8% . By designing a distributed online learning service, councils were provided with the right amount of autonomy to best manage their local volunteers while providing a standarized curriculum across the Movement.

Work Samples

Problem statement:  How might we implement Movement- wide online learning experience for Volunteer Troop Leaders, so that leaders across councils receive a foundational baseline set of skills and competencies that’s measurable and trackable in a flexible, unified system?

Persona development: