Overview

Hey Congress is a mobile app born from my firsthand experience as a congressional intern. During my two internships, I spent countless hours manually reviewing and organizing constituent correspondence to relay to congressional leaders. This experience revealed a clear need for better civic engagement tools. The app simplifies communication by allowing users to easily share their opinions, track issues they care about, and see how their representatives are voting. By automating what I once did manually, the app saves time for both constituents and congressional offices—organizing feedback and streamlining responses to make civic engagement more accessible and efficient for everyone.

Challenge

How can we use tech to make it easier for people to talk to Congress, count feedback faster, save time and money, and help more folks get involved?

Solution

• Conducted user research, including 10 interviews, to identify key needs and preferences

• Developed personas and user flows to address both constituent and legislator needs

• Created a functional prototype prioritizing key features for the MVP

• Iterated on the design based on user testing feedback, particularly improving the onboarding process

Conclusion

• Overcame challenges in creating clear user journeys

• As my first official UX project, gained valuable insights into the UX design process and user-centered design principles

• Identified future development possibilities, including using no-code tools

• Demonstrated the potential of technology to improve civic engagement and communication with elected officials