Program planning is an effective way to define, outline, and manage an organization’s events and evaluate their outcomes (Diaz, Gusto, & Diehl, 2018). Within the Student Life Office at the University of Hawaiʻi – West Oʻahu, students use Program Planning to promote events and conduct meetings for resources, activities, and outcomes. As part of an organization’s training, students must take the Program Planning training before they run an event. However, due to their busy schedules, some students are unable to attend the in-person training sessions. To overcome the limitations of in-person training, an online training was developed to ensure more students are able to participate. The new training was designed to promote student learning through game-based methods in the style of a visual novel.

A usability study was conducted to evaluate the online instruction created for the Student Life Office. The purpose of this study was to evaluate if the training was easy to use, simple to navigate, and resulted in user satisfaction. In total, eight (n = 8) students participated in the study. Data from the usability study suggests that participants are eager for the Program Planning training to be initiated.

This presentation will discuss study methods, evaluation instruments, and results. While creating the training was a feat in itself, the researcher found that testing how students react to the training was equally important. The feedback and criticism collected through different rounds of usability testing, helped the researcher refine the prototype. While it was determined that this training can be used with future students, the researcher suggests a learning assessment be conducted prior to circulating the training.