What the Kit!? Logo on kraft
Good afternoon! I hope that we are all doing well and are feeling great about everything! I wouldn’t have been able to say the same for myself recently, especially throughout the last few years of my degree, it’s been a bit of a whirlwind and I have had a wobbly time trying to get my shit together!
So, I’d like you guys to put yourselves back in our shoes, think about being a stressed out undergraduate who is trying to get their shit together before finishing their degree and heading out into this thing we call the “real world”.
What the Kit!? is for undergraduates of all disciplines who don’t know quite how to deal with the stress of university and life in general as everything is just getting a bit hectic and too much.
It is a kit that they can literally get their hands on in order to help try and get their shit together before graduating and heading out into the ‘real adulting world’.
My proposal was looking at how designers could use sensory design in order to trigger their target audience’s nostalgia. I was finding it rather difficult trying to figure out how to curate and put this into the works, as there were many different tangents and possible variants. I was getting quite distraught on how exactly to attack this.
With an interest in generation Z, as they are the majority of the people around me, therefore a great group to focus on, I decided I had to look at what I had already done. I asked myself “So, what am I actually trying to do here, and more importantly, why?”.
I came to the conclusion of encouraging people to feel better with what stress they’re surrounding themselves with, in terms of both university and what is happening in their life. Along with getting people to interact and engage with what I produced.
So, how can design help navigate the stress of undergraduates through an interactive output?
What the Kit!? is for stressed out undergraduates attempting to get their shit together. In an interview about tertiary students mental health with Stuff, the president of the New Zealand Union of Students Associations, Jonathan Gee says
“You can’t really see it [the importance of your mental health] when you’re stuck in a bubble and you have got these deadlines and you don’t know where you’re going to go with your life. It can seem a bit much”.
During university at all stages, we are faced with all sorts of stress. We start settling ourselves down about the excitement of being independent and getting a degree, and we see the need to focus and hone in. For a number of students, we have also moved out of home and, in general, there are many other things that life can throw at us.
And unfortunately, we just don’t know how to deal with the stress of it all. In June and July of this year, New Zealand Union of Student Associations ran a survey called Kei Te Pai for students around their mental health experience. And out of one thousand seven hundred and sixty two students who responded, 56% said they had considered dropping out of tertiary study. With the main reasons being that they were “feeling overwhelmed, living with mental illness and fearing failure.”
What the Kit!? is used to get stressed out undergraduates to take a step back and use different suggested methods in order to tackle their life.
At the beginning of our degrees we are provided with a lot of information and shown what is available to help us cope with life at university. However, there is an element missing which needs to be able to help us navigate our way through the shit, and get it together. Students are given What the Kit!? at this time that guides them on how to take a step back to help themselves with the stress.
The central proposition and intention of What the Kit!? is to help people in a similar boat to myself, make them feel not so alone throughout these stressful years, and to help guide them in getting their shit together. Giving them a hand, with the contents of the provided handbook, A Loosely Fitted Guide on How to Get Your Shit Together written from my point of view, being a fellow stressed out student.
So, imagine you’re a stressed out undergraduate looking for a hand, and this poster catches your eye on campus, you follow the directions to go to your student association and pick up one of these kits.
You open the bag, which is super handy to chuck in your school bag or car for when you need something to help carry all of your extra shit,
And you find A Loosely Fitted Guide on How to Get Your Shit Together inside, and the What the Kit!? box. Naturally, you will flick through the book to have a look at the gist of what is going on, and also open up the box.Once you open the box you will find a note with the The Tools which explains what this little tool kit is. The note explains that the tools are individually wrapped with a tag as a small give away of what it is, or when to use it. Almost like a like a lucky dip that we had when we were children. These tools are to be opened when you see fit, some of them are tools that are going to help you, but a handful are also small things to keep your brain ticking while you are procrastinating.
The handbook A Loosely Fitted Guide on How to Get Your Shit Together will be beneficial to the user as it gives the perspective of a fellow stressing student, essentially showing them that they are not alone through the stresses of university.
Hopefully giving them a giggle and something to relate to, as well as teaching them that taking breaks is not only encouraged but necessary in order to help recharge your brain.
And to keep their brain ticking while procrastinating, doing small brain teasers, as it can boost overall brain activity, increase memory power, and improve concentration.
I’m not much of a writer, but making the contents for what the kit was a fun challenge. I use the point of view that speaks to numerous amounts of students, I sent out the words for people of all disciplines to have a read and the feedback they gave was positive, in saying they really enjoyed the fact that they aren’t alone with the stresses of uni.
What the Kit!? uses the tone of voice that is a little bit frantic, with a touch of explicit language, as myself and other students seem to have a bit more of a potty mouth when we are stressing out.
Using this tone not only reassures that I was stressed at the time of writing and curating, but also shows that I was in the exact same boat as them while trying to get my shit together.
Sometimes we can feel like everybody who are in the same boats as us are going with the flow, and just cruising around us, but in fact people around are just as stressed as you. So, having a helping hand guiding you through this and not making you feel so alone would be such a wonderful tool.
In curating What the Kit!? I wasn’t sure on what kind of style I was going for, so I just began sketching, doodling and to start brainstorming ideas, and also do some productive procrastination, as doodling is something that makes me happy. This turned highly in my favour as I created all of the typography by hand and then scanned and refined it to make it look consistent.
It is printed on 100% recycled paper to give the user that little boost about doing their part for the environment. It ended up looking like a scrapbook, with items crafted by hand, it reflects the doodles and piecing together that a student would be doing in their own pages of notes.
It evokes the idea of getting hands-on with the kit, which is exactly what I want What the Kit!? to encourage.
With a number of different approaches in the handbook, stressed out students are given information in easily digested short paragraphs, making it not such a drag to read through. It is also broken up with different tasks and procrastination tools, some to help get them where want to go, and some to ignite the child living inside of them.
The book speaks to both sexes that are going through stresses, the sections of the handbook are as follows with sub-sections: About This Shit, which introduces the concept of the book and where it’s coming from
Oh for Keepsake, which explains the importance of nostalgia and memory keeping and how you can use it to make yourself feel better about where you’re at. As per the research in my proposal, having nostalgia be something that is almost a ‘mental safe zone’, so they feel safe and comfortable or ‘at home’ due to the evoked nostalgia.
Curating your Happy, where you are encouraged to surround yourself with the things and people that make you the happiest in order to get you to step back into a less stressful area.
The Importance of taking a step back focuses on not getting caught in the hurricane that is your stressing and to do lists, but it also guides you on how to step back so you can look at the bigger picture in order to help you prioritise
It’s All About You speaks to everyone in the sense that you need to be focusing on yourself, for your sanity and also to not be comparing where you’re at to everybody else. Even the Be Your Own Beyonce section, where I justify that even if you’re not a fan of Beyonce, you know that she not only slays her days, but she’s also just a human too, so don’t try to run yourself out or you will run yourself down
And finally, Trying not to be Bambi on Ice where I suggest ways in how to act like everything is together, and if you look and feel like someone who has their shit together, the likelihood is going to be that you are.
Along with how to try and go out into the ‘real adulting world’ with your head screwed on somewhat straight.
I curated what the kit while being a stressed out undergraduate and attempting to get my shit together, while trying to act composed.
What the Kit!? is put together with the intent that stressed out undergraduates will be able to use the kit to get away from the stress of their day for however long they desire.
It is an interactive kit which offers pointers and tips to help people take a step back and look at the bigger picture, getting them to feel a little bit better about where they are at. It encourages stressed students to take a break to reset their busy minds, using the tools of the kit in order to help get their shit together!
If I were to continue with putting this kit into action, I would push the interactive aspect much more by having a website with a live blog where people are able to post their queries or own tips. Or eventually expanding into different areas, like how to get your shit together and get a job, or expand on the section on adulting and how to get your shit together and be a real grown.
I would be curating and talking about these experiences, once again as they are happening!
And now I think it’s safe to say I managed to get my shit somewhat together by the end of this research project!
Thank you for listening! Feel free to unwrap the kits if you would like to have a nosey!
