EdTech Web dashboard Educators · Admins · Principals Live

The dashboard they'd
actually open.

An underused educator dashboard, rebuilt into a unified, workflow-driven tool — built around how teachers, admins and principals really work.

app.highlandsbrain.com/home
HB
Role
Product Designer — research → ship
Industry
EdTech · educator-facing web platform
Status
Live in the field with real staff
Year
2024 — 2025, ongoing iteration
In short

An educator dashboard people worked around — rebuilt into a tool they actually open.

  • Staff handled attendance, progress and comms on paper, in spreadsheets, over texts.
  • Rebuilt around real workflows — useful modules, fast daily tasks, connected flow.
  • Now live in the field with educators, admins and principals.
The needle +18% increase in user retention after the rebuild
(01) — Context

It existed — but went unused

The dashboard existed — it just wasn't being used.

Educators, admins and principals were all expected to manage attendance, track progress and communicate through one centralized system. In reality those workflows were either avoided entirely or handled somewhere else — on paper, in spreadsheets, over personal texts. The product existed, but it never became part of anyone's daily work.

(02) — The problem

A tool, worked around

Educators weren't struggling to teach — they were struggling with a dashboard that didn't fit their work.

Where the work actually happened Share of each core task handled in-platform — and where the rest leaked back to.
Observed usage
Attendance
0% Leaked to mostly on paper
Progress tracking
0% Leaked to private spreadsheets
Communication
0% Leaked to broken chat · personal texts
Reports & review
0% Leaked to often avoided entirely

The pattern: the more friction a module added, the more it got skipped — until staff relied on the dashboard less over time, not more. (Illustrative of observed usage.)

What broke
01

Modules with no actionable value

Screens showed data but offered no next step, so adoption never took hold.

02

Attendance was cluttered & slow

The one task done every day was the most inefficient — so it moved back to paper.

03

Disconnected, with no flow

Nothing led to the next thing. Each task was an island, and the whole felt incoherent.

04

Too complex for leadership

A messy, heavy interface meant admins and principals simply avoided the system.

The more friction a module added, the more it got skipped — until people relied on it less, not more.
The pattern behind the rebuild
(03) — Key insight

Usability, not features

The problem wasn't a lack of features — it was a lack of usability and trust.

People ignored anything that didn't pay off immediately, repetitive tasks had to be fast and reliable, and a lack of structure made the whole system feel unpredictable and hard to learn.

The old briefBuild more features
The real oneMake workflows usable
(04) — The approach

Rebuilt around workflows

Stop redesigning screens in isolation — rebuild around real workflows.

01

Make features useful

Adoption follows value — every module had to earn its place.

02

Simplify the daily tasks

Attendance and other everyday jobs had to be fast and reliable.

03

Connect the modules

One coherent flow across tasks instead of disconnected islands.

04

Fix communication

Integrated chat plus AI support, built right into the work.

(05) — The solution

One connected workspace

A dashboard rebuilt around what staff do every day — every module connected, and finally worth opening.

app.highlandsbrain.com/home
HB
Click the tabs — walk through the real product, screen by screen.
The modules
(06) — Impact

What it moved

+18%
Increase in user retention
A unified, workflow-driven experience improved engagement and accessibility — the dashboard became part of the daily routine instead of a tool people worked around.
Higher adoption

Useful, actionable modules gave staff a reason to open the product daily.

Faster attendance

The cluttered daily task became a seamless, reliable one-glance flow.

Connected comms

Structured chat with AI support replaced scattered personal channels.

(07) — Behind the scenes

Useful, not just functional

Designing the dashboard meant breaking complex workflows down and rebuilding them into simple, usable systems.

From early explorations to refined interfaces, one test settled every decision: does this actually help someone get their work done? Functional was the floor — useful was the bar.

Home · monitoring
Attendance
Communication · AI
NFC · insights
Transit pass
Master agreement
Emergency alert
Sign-in
FIG 7.1 The full surface — every module in the redesigned dashboard, one connected system.
Next — commerce, conversion-led Games The Shop
Open for 2026

Have a product
to ship?

A redesign on the horizon, a 0→1 in your head, or just want to argue about button radii? My inbox is open.

akshatt4@gmail.com