Expanding Educational Access for 5M+ Students with Learning Disabilities Across India
My Role(s)
Product Designer, UX Researcher
Team
Independent Project
Timeline
January 2025 – June 2025 (5 months)
Tools
Figma, Adobe Illustrator, UX Research, Accessibility Design, Design Strategy, Prototyping, Inclusive Design, Human-Centered Research
Context
In India, millions of children with learning disabilities such as dyslexia, ADHD, and autism face barriers to quality education. Limited awareness, inaccessible teaching tools, and the stigma surrounding neurodiversity contribute to an exclusionary learning environment.
Saksham, meaning “capable” in Hindi, is my personal UX project that explores how digital design can make education more inclusive, accessible, and empowering for neurodivergent students. What began as a passion project became a deeper research initiative—eventually published on Cal Poly’s Digital Commons and now set to be featured in the Technical Association of the Graphic Arts Journal, recognizing its contribution to inclusive design in education technology.
As the Product Designer and UX Researcher, I…
Conducted user research and interviews to identify pain points and needs.
Developed wireframes, prototypes, and user flows to visualize design solutions.
Iterated on designs based on user feedback and usability testing.
Applied UX principles to ensure accessibility, usability, and intuitive interactions.
Documented insights and design decisions to guide potential implementation.
Problem
Children with learning disabilities in India often lack access to tools that support their specific needs. Schools rarely integrate assistive technologies, and most educational apps are not designed for cognitive diversity.
The challenge:
How might we create an educational experience that adapts to each learner’s cognitive style, while promoting independence and confidence?
Interviews
Literature Review
Research & Key Insights
My research process combined qualitative inquiry, secondary analysis, and competitive benchmarking to explore how accessibility and inclusive design can be better integrated into educational technology for children with learning disabilities.
1. Surveys and Data Collection
Prior to conducting interviews, I designed and distributed online surveys to educators, parents, and students to gather quantitative insights into accessibility and inclusivity in educational technology. The surveys focused on platform usability, adaptability, engagement, and emotional impact, particularly for neurodiverse learners.
Data Findings:
Accessibility Gaps: 68% of respondents reported that existing digital platforms lacked features to support cognitive and emotional differences, such as adjustable pacing or simplified instructions.
Adaptability Needs: 74% indicated that current edtech tools were too rigid, making it difficult to customize learning paths for individual students.
Emotional Impact: 61% of respondents noted that learners often feel frustrated, anxious, or excluded due to the lack of inclusive design.
Preferred Features: Participants highlighted the importance of multimodal content, progress tracking, personalized feedback, and culturally responsive materials to improve engagement and learning outcomes.
The survey results reveal clear patterns of need in edtech, emphasizing that flexible, inclusive, and emotionally sensitive tools are essential to better support neurodiverse learners and create equitable learning experiences.
2. Interviews
I began by conducting semi-structured interviews with educators, parents, and accessibility specialists to uncover pain points in current learning environments. These conversations revealed recurring themes around inconsistent accessibility standards, limited adaptability of digital platforms, and the emotional impact of exclusion on both learners and caregivers.
3. Literature Review
To complement these qualitative insights, I conducted a literature review on inclusive education, universal design for learning (UDL), and assistive technology adoption. This helped contextualize participant experiences within broader systemic and design frameworks.
4. Comparative Analysis
I conducted a comparative analysis of leading educational technology platforms—Byju’s, Duolingo, and Microsoft Learning Tools—to evaluate their accessibility and inclusivity for neurodiverse learners. The analysis focused on key features including text-to-speech, adaptive interfaces, multimodal content delivery, and progress tracking.
Findings:
Byju’s: Strong in visual accessibility (high contrast, adjustable fonts) and engaging video content, but limited in adaptive pacing or cognitive accessibility for learners with ADHD or dyslexia.
Duolingo: Offers gamified learning and immediate feedback, supporting engagement, yet customization for cognitive or emotional needs is minimal. Cultural representation in content is also limited.
Microsoft Learning Tools: Excels in cognitive accessibility with features like immersive reader, read-aloud, and simplified text formatting, but emotional inclusivity and personalized pacing are less robust.
5. Synthesis:
While each platform addresses some aspects of accessibility, few provide comprehensive support for cognitive and emotional inclusivity, particularly regarding personalized learning pacing, simplified feedback, and culturally responsive content. This highlights a significant gap in current edtech solutions for neurodiverse learners, underscoring the need for tools that integrate flexibility, inclusivity, and engagement at both cognitive and emotional levels.
Empathize
I developed personas grounded in real interviews with students, educators, and parents to capture their unique needs, frustrations, and motivations within neurodiverse learning environments.
Ayaan Khan (Student)
Age: 14
Location: Pune, India
Background: A passionate cricket player with dyslexia, ADHD, and mild autism. Due to limited access to inclusive education, Ayaan relies on visual, hands-on learning methods.
Goals: Learn at his own pace, access clear visual lessons, and improve reading and writing skills.
Frustrations: Overwhelmed by text-heavy lessons, inconsistent teaching, and lack of adaptive tools.
Needs: Supportive, non-judgmental environment with audio-visual aids and progress tracking.
Meera Shah (Educator)
Age: 36
Occupation: Primary school teacher at New Grace English School, Pune
Background: Experienced educator passionate about inclusion but challenged by limited resources
and large class sizes.
Goals: Create engaging, inclusive lessons; use adaptive tools; and receive better training.
Frustrations: Lack of institutional support, time, and knowledge of accessible design.
Needs: Platforms for differentiated instruction and time-saving adaptive teaching tools
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learners benefit most from emotionally supportive and flexible design systems that adapt to varied cognitive and sensory needs.
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often compensating for design limitations through manual intervention.
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balancing measurable accessibility outcomes with the nuanced experiences of real users.
Process
2. Define
The goal was to design a learning experience that:
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3. Ideate
Brainstormed design ideas using mind maps and low-fidelity/mid-fidelity wireframes in Figma.
Concepts explored included a voice-guided reading assistant, emotion-based feedback tracking to identify when learners feel overwhelmed, and a reward system to foster motivation and confidence.
4. Prototype
The prototype is optimized for web, for the best viewing experience view on desktop.
Key Insights
Synthesizing data from all research approaches, these are the main insights:
Comparative Analysis
Surveys
Synthesis
5. Testing
Conducted think-aloud studies with educators and children with dyslexia and ADHD to evaluate usability and accessibility.
Feedback led to refinements such as a simplified navigation bar, added voice cues for non-readers, and reduced visual motion
Impact
My design and research contributed to measurable business and user outcomes:
Research Recognition:
Published on Cal Poly’s Digital Commons and accepted for TAGA Journal 2025, highlighting the project’s relevance in accessibility research.
Social Impact:
Inspired discussions among educators and nonprofits in India about scalable inclusive education tools.
Reflection
Saksham taught me that accessibility is not a feature—it’s a mindset. Designing for neurodiversity requires empathy, iteration, and the willingness to challenge assumptions about “standard” users.
Moving forward, I plan to:
Collaborate with Indian NGOs to develop a pilot version of Saksham
I learned how essential it is to simplify complex technical products into language and visuals that anyone can understand.
Integrate AI-driven personalization for real-time learning support
Running A/B tests and think-aloud sessions reminded me that design decisions only hold weight when validated by users.
Expand research on cross-cultural inclusivity in educational UX
Regular client standups taught me the value of integrating feedback continuously to create something both functional and meaningful.
Design Evolution:
Served as a foundation for exploring government-level templates for accessible education across regions in India.
Full Research Paper
This case study is based on my research project, “Saksham: Designing Inclusive Educational Tools for Children with Learning Disabilities in India”
You can read the full research paper here: Saksham Research Paper