Collaborative Earth | Sift
Developing an open-source platform for resource sharing and collaboration amongst Forest Restoration Practitioners.
About the project
A team of four designers from California College collaborated with Collaborative Earth on their capstone project. Over the course of 8 months, we conducted extensive research and developed a tool for practitioners to test and use.
Learn more about Collaborative Earth
Year
2024
Role
UX Research, User Testing, Prototype, UI Design
Team
Kirtana Kannan, Priyam Shah, Rishma Bora, Anusha Thalnerkar
Mentor
Rochelle Ardhesher, Marc O’ Brien

What is Collaborative Earth?

Consisting of 2,400 members, including volunteers, scientists, engineers, and other team members, Collaborative Earth operate in various ecological regeneration labs to co-create pathways for social and ecological regeneration.One of these labs focuses on assisted forest regeneration.

Challenge

We received the brief from the Collaborative Earth with a mission to review and synthesize the data due to the abundance of unpublished research, documents, and case studies, some of which are in non-English formats.

Outcome

We received the brief from the Collaborative Earth with a mission to review and synthesize the data due to the abundance of unpublished research, documents, and case studies, some of which are in non-English formats.

Smart Search Engine

Searching for case studies, papers, and publications by location or implementation stage can be a valuable and easily accessible resource.

Smart Resource Review

Users can upload their resources or materials to quickly generate and analyze insights with the help of artificial intelligence, allowing them to review papers more efficiently

Annotate & Collaborate

Practitioners can save resources in the workspace, collaborate with team members, and have discussions all in one place.

User journey mapping
Who are the practitioners and how do they work?

Early Stage Research

Studying the site & gathering
a team

Fundraise

Project scoping & funding opportunities

Implementation

Planning & preparing the soil

Monitoring

Tracking & measuring plant growth

Reporting

Reporting all outcomes

in one study
843 publications
were collected, screened down to 118, and finally, 94 publications were fully read by practitoners
From 1990 to 2022
23,755 articles
related to ecological restoration were retrieved from the core database of Web of Science.
Interview insights

What the practitioners had to say?

“For restoration to be successful, it should improve people’s livelihoods - primarily financial.”
Restoration Ecologist at Collaborative Earth
“I would note that use of a mapping program has been a bit of an obstacle maybe in certain projects.”
Organization Lead at Collaborative Earth
“Building a centralized digital tool will be really helpful for the people to access”
Restoration Ecologist at Collaborative Earth
synthesis
We asked the practitioners

We conducted desk research on the contents of gray literature, how they currently utilize their data, and their methods.

Drivers of Success & Community Contribution

Practitioners tend to look for certain tools and resources. Metrics like income and
well-being of local communities are often overlooked, but crucial for project success.

Utilization of Tools

There is a lack of one universal tool that aggregates key features for restoration practitioners.

Literature Scanning and Documentation Challenges

It is challenging for practitioners to efficiently scan literature, in short time periods.

Overcoming Failures

Practitioners tend to look for certain tools and resources. Metrics like income and well-being of local communities are often overlooked, but crucial for project success.

We collaborated to develop ideas
how might we
Provide standardized information and facilitate collaboration among restoration practitioners?
Envisioning outcomes
What did we do with our findings?

Analyzing Sources and Article Counts to Identify Research Gaps

Practitioners tend to look for certain tools and resources. Metrics like income and well-being of local communities are often overlooked, but crucial for project success.

Validating Data Categorization and Flow with Card Sorting

Card sorting was important to make sure if the categorization of data is validated and whether the navigation is accurate

Early ideation
We brainstormed with participants' insights, focusing on information accuracy and tracking progress for volunteers and practitioners.
validation & post testing
What didn't go as planned?

Search and smart insights will not include conversational design

AI will be integrated into the platform's backend to generate content, summarize papers, and consider users' locations. The smart search engine won't feature conversational design, which is suited for models like ChatGPT.

Verified information from practitioners is more reliable

Volunteers can't upload projects due to a lack of training and expertise required for paper publication and review.

Repository Tool for Links, Resources, and Case Studies

The tool provides links, resources, and case studies, serving as a repository for practitioners rather than hosting their projects.

ultimate outcome

Easily search documents and receive smart summaries

Searching for case studies, papers, and publications by location or implementation stage can be a valuable and easily accessible resource.

Gain instant insights by uploading a file, enabling you to quickly extract valuable information.

AI-powered insights help practitioners use search engines to find relevant facts and figures.

Based on the uploaded document, they can access a variety of content, including case studies, research papers, and local knowledge.

Collaborate and share resources with your team, while having a secure personal space to save your own materials.

People can easily collaborate in a shared workspace, where they can view saved resources and comment to communicate with team members.

Regions covered across the globe
No. of articles made available
Language accessibility and the number of people referring to each language
No. of partnered labs
No. of articles saved to indicate actual usage
No. of users that will sign up on the site