Winter 2024
The Bishop Blue Foundation keeps alive the legacy of Bishop College, the HBCU (Historically Black College/University) established by Northern missionaries and freedmen in Marshall, Texas in 1881. Bishop moved to Dallas in 1961 and, by the time it closed in 1988, was known for producing dynamic teachers and preachers.
“Our mission is to preserve the legacy of Bishop College and its commitment to community development. Bishop offered community learning opportunities such as training scout troop leaders and hosting nationally known speakers on its campuses. Today, the Bishop Foundation seeks to have a similar impact with programs that generate interest in and appreciation of history. Our foundation, a 501(c)3 nonprofit corporation, is the living legacy of Bishop College”.
Interviewees’ memories intertwine with a scholarship from the fields of history, education, law, and civil rights to present entertaining lessons on the role education plays in the American Dream and the pursuit of happiness.
The SCHOOL SAGAS Project tackles the urgent need to educate students about the historical consequences of segregated schooling by curating oral histories and school experiences. Through an immersive, technology-driven platform, we foster empathy, understanding, and a collective commitment to inclusivity. Our solution upgrades the current non-interactive platform by integrating storytelling and interactive elements, ensuring a visually appealing, user-friendly, low-tech, and easily maintainable website. Seamlessly integrated within Bishop Blue's website, the platform empowers users, primarily students, to explore under-told stories and understand the challenges faced in the pursuit of educational equity.
In the scoping phase, the client emphasized the need for integrating immersive storytelling and interactive elements to enhance user engagement, fostering empathy and a collective commitment to inclusivity among students exploring the platform. To kick off initial drafts, our design team opted for Figma, a familiar tool for efficient prototyping. After thorough consideration of low-cost and low-tech platforms, we selected Cargo for its cost-effectiveness for non-profit organizations. Despite being a new platform for our team, we conducted extensive research and familiarization to ensure its effective utilization. The designers dedicated time to understanding Cargo's capabilities and limitations, allowing them to tailor the platform to meet the project's objectives effectively. Through this process, the team ensured that the final product would fulfill the client's vision while leveraging the unique features and limitations offered by Cargo for an engaging user experience.
During the implementation phase of the Bishop Blue main website project, our focus was on creating an engaging and informative platform reflecting the foundation's mission and history. Initially, we planned a side-by-side layout with text and images for visual appeal and informative content. However, due to the limitations of the Cargo platform, we adapted the design to a vertical layout, ensuring compatibility while maintaining user engagement.