Usability in Civic Life

Research useful for civic and elections design is scattered into many different disciplines, from political science to computer science to work on design, reading, and accessibility. The Civic De...

https://www.usabilityinciviclife.org/the-civic-design-bibliography/

Experiences as a poll worker in New York City. Continue reading →

https://www.usabilityinciviclife.org/viewfromthescanner/

In 2010, New York State used paper ballots for the first time.  Unfortunately, a NY League of Women Voters survey after the election found that many voters found the ballots hard to use because ...

https://www.usabilityinciviclife.org/a-better-ballot-for-ny/

There are great lists of guidelines and tips for writing in plain language, but when you are faced with making confusing instructions clear, where do you start? One way is to think about plain la...

https://www.usabilityinciviclife.org/plain-language-is-a-process/

At the annual gathering of county clerks, recorders, election officials, and treasurers, the closing keynote featured tips on how writing that everyone can understand can help officials do their ...

https://www.usabilityinciviclife.org/saving-your-budget-with-plain-language/

The business of trying to design better elections has it’s ups and downs. What’s going on in New York State is a good example. Good news. In 2010, New York State switched from lever machines ...

https://www.usabilityinciviclife.org/hello-new-york-what-will-your-ballot-look-like-in-november/

A group of user experience (UX) professionals grappled issues surrounding design for civic purposes in a workshop:  “When the Audience is Citizens,” conducted at the User Experience Professi...

https://www.usabilityinciviclife.org/when-the-audience-is-citizens-upa2012/

At the CHI 2012 conference in Austin, Whitney joined Janice Tasi, Ben Bederson, Lorrie Faith Cranor and Herb Lin for a panel discussion – Occupy CHI! Engaging U.S. Policy Makers. Lorrie Fait...

https://www.usabilityinciviclife.org/engaging-policy-makers/

A new report from the Brennan Center for Justice concludes that  in 2010, tens of thousands of votes in New York did not count because of errors — errors that can be easily caught or prevented...

https://www.usabilityinciviclife.org/lost-votes/

On a Saturday in October 2010, a group of Usability in Civic Life volunteered went to five locations to run a flash usability test to learn how New Yorkers marked their new optical scan ballots, ...

https://www.usabilityinciviclife.org/testing-for-double-votes-in-new-york/