College planning should feel easier to understand.
I'm Vivek, a CollegeHound student intern. I spent the summer noticing the small things that could make the product clearer, calmer, and easier for students to use.
CollegeHound is free. Scout is the optional paid AI upgrade.
Meet Vivek
CollegeHound student intern
During my internship, I tested CollegeHound from a student's point of view. I paid attention to where information lived, how Scout's answers felt, and whether the product made the next step easier or harder to understand.
- What I focused on
- Product organization, wording, Scout responses, and student experience
- The idea I'm proudest of
- Making the Binder the real hub of CollegeHound
- Why it mattered
- The Binder idea closely matched the direction the next version was already taking
- New skills
- Product feedback, interface review, clearer writing, and communicating findings
A product can technically work and still feel confusing. I tried to notice the difference.
The idea he kept coming back to
Make the Binder the center
Information and tools were spread across different parts of CollegeHound. Vivek recommended bringing planning, notes, and next steps into the Binder so students would have one clear place to return to.
What he noticed
Important information could feel spread across different sections.
Vivek's idea
Make the Binder the main hub for saved information, planning, notes, and next steps.
Why it stood out
Before seeing the team's future plans, he independently recommended nearly the same Binder-centered direction already being developed for the next version.
The feedback that changed the most
Being right is not the same as being reassuring
Scout's answers were accurate. Vivek pointed out that an accurate answer can still land cold on a student who is already anxious about college, and that how Scout says something matters as much as what it says.
What he flagged
Answers that were correct but too long, too blunt, or hard for a student to absorb in the moment.
What it became
His notes are the basis for thousands of lines of specification covering how Scout is meant to speak to students.
What changed
New onboarding and a new set of Scout prompts were designed around the feedback he gave.
The assumption he caught
Not every student starts with the same information
Some of what we treated as basic information was not obvious to every student. Vivek pointed out that terms and steps which look standard from the inside are not standard for everyone.
A product should not assume a student already knows.
Small details change how a product feels
Three more things I flagged during the internship.
Clearer placement
I noticed when a feature seemed to live in the wrong part of the product.
Details that were missing
I flagged parts of the design that were absent or did not feel right, not only the parts that were wrong.
More student-friendly language
I identified wording that sounded like internal product language instead of something a student would naturally understand.
Everything on this list is being worked on right now. Some of the hardest work going into the next version of CollegeHound started as an item Vivek flagged.
Sharp Eye Award · CollegeHound Summer Internship 2026
Vivek won the Sharp Eye Award
He noticed what everyone else walked past.
Design details
Missing icons and inconsistent labels that others read straight past.
Tone
That a correct answer can still land cold on a student who is already anxious.
Assumed knowledge
Terms we treated as basic that a first-time student would not know yet.
“Awarded to the intern who noticed what everyone else walked past.
Most people use a product without seeing the small things that are wrong with it. The jargon that slipped through. The missing icon. The inconsistent label. The moment a correct answer landed colder than it should have.
Vivek saw those things. His eye caught details that others passed over, and several of them are fixed now because he was the person who noticed.”
Ed Psyk and Shelley Psyk · CollegeHound co-founders
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