Near the end of 2021 there was a massive wildfire that caused a severe amount of damage to Lake Tahoe and the surrounding areas burning 221,835 acres. These devastating fires meant that the need for volunteers was greatly increased as the fire was spreading rapidly with nearly no end in sight. The outcry for help in the community was widespread on social media and on the local and even world news. Firefighters, evacuation areas, and food and resource donations were all needed immediately. However, finding clear ways to help was extremely difficult, Facebook in particular was a mess with people constantly asking how they could help with no clear answer being easily provided. Many Facebook groups popped up in that time that involved many scrambling to coordinate ways to help.

This is an ongoing problem that will not stop and volunteers are still needed to not only help with recovery from the Caldor fire but also prevention as we approach another year of potential wildfires in summer.

With a hypothesis in mind and a better understanding of the current landscape, I started my research by conducting user interviews. I gathered a group of twenty participants, some in person and others over the phone. Since I live in Reno, Nevada, I had easy access to participants who actually live close to or around Tahoe National Forest. This group of participants was partially gathered by reaching out to people that had joined the previously mentioned Facebook groups during the duration of the fire or had mentioned "forest conservation work” or a similar term in their bio on social media.

Some of the people interviewed during this process were directly impacted by the Caldor fire, losing their homes or a building they owned. This topic is very sensitive for some of the participants so despite going into the interviews knowing I had information I needed to acquire for my research, I wanted to be sure the interviews felt very natural and were conversational.

I went into each of the interviews knowing I needed answers to the following four questions:

• Do they volunteer for forest conservation currently?

• How often do they volunteer?

• How do they find volunteer opportunities?

• If they would volunteer more often if they had an easier way to find opportunities?

Upon the completion of my interviews, I used the information from the interviews to create empathy maps to bring the data together so I could clearly map out the potential users needs and pain points. A primary user group identified through this research was working adults who don’t have time to dig through multiple outdated online government resources and websites for volunteer opportunities.

This user group confirmed some initial assumptions about the current existing online resources for finding volunteer opportunities. This research also helped make it clear that some users would be willing to travel to help in other locations but users want to see nearby volunteer opportunities first while making sure there is enough information provided to be sure the opportunity is a fit.

The data collected from these interviews also helped identify the next steps and the proper platform for this solution. With potential users typically being busy and wanting a form of social integration, a mobile app made the most sense as a first iteration.

Digital Wireframes

Bringing together all of the previous research, I was able to clearly identify a solid starting point for wireframes. The wireframes were made with streamlined usability as a top priority making filtering quick and painless so that users can find opportunities that apply to them easily.

Low-fidelity prototype

Using the completed set of digital wireframes, I created a low-fidelity prototype. I built out the volunteer finder’s primary user flow, so the prototype could be used in a usability study.