product
Checkpoint
Academic Planning & Workload Visualization Platform
Product Designer & Full-Stack Developer
2025
Solo Project
Impact
3
Views
Primary visualization modes (heatmap, graph, editor)
100%
Persistence
User data retained via local storage
Multiple
Scenarios
What-if semester planning supported
Overview
Checkpoint is an academic planning web app that helps students proactively plan semesters by visualizing course workload, assessment density, and prerequisite paths. It highlights high-stress weeks through a semester heatmap, maps prerequisite relationships to target courses, and allows students to model different academic scenarios before committing to a schedule.
Tech Stack
ReactTypeScriptData VisualizationClient-Side PersistenceGraph VisualizationUI/UX Design
Challenges
- 1Visualizing academic workload in a way that is intuitive at a glance
- 2Designing flexible data models for courses, assessments, and prerequisites
- 3Preventing UI overload while displaying dense academic information
- 4Planning for future LMS integration without backend dependencies
Solutions
- ✓Implemented a calendar-based heatmap to aggregate assessments by week and intensity
- ✓Designed normalized course and assessment schemas with extensible relationships
- ✓Used progressive disclosure and visual hierarchy to reduce cognitive load
- ✓Architected an LMS-agnostic data import layer to support future integrations
Key Learnings
01
Designing data visualizations for non-technical users
02
Balancing product UX with technical extensibility
03
Structuring client-side state for complex, interrelated datasets
04
Planning integration-ready systems without premature backend complexity