How to use Brightn for EECS Students

Section 1

Get Brightn on your school Chromebook

If most of your school day happens on your Chromebook, you can install Brightn right there from the Google Play Store. If you would rather just use your phone, skip this one and jump to the next section. Either way works, and your account syncs across both.

Watch: turning on the Google Play Store and installing an app on a Chromebook.

Turn on the Google Play Store

1. Make sure your Chromebook is up to date. Play Store apps need a current version of ChromeOS.
2. In the bottom right corner, select the time.
3. Open Settings, then Apps, then Manage Google Play preferences.
4. If the Play Store is not on yet, you will see a Turn on button. Select it.
5. Follow the prompts on screen and accept the terms of service.

Install Brightn

1. Open the Launcher in the bottom left corner and find the Play Store.
2. Search for Brightn.
3. Select Install.
4. When it finishes, Brightn shows up in your Launcher. Right click the icon and choose Pin to keep it on your shelf at the bottom.

One more thing worth knowing: apps you install from the Play Store are tied to the first account signed in on that Chromebook. If you share the device, use your own account.

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Section 2

Getting started and your Brightn Zone

When you first open Brightn, you will go through a short setup so the app fits your life instead of some generic version of it. Nothing here is a test and nobody at school sees your answers. The more honest you are, the more useful your plan will be.

Watch: setting up your account and building your first plan.

Tell Brightn a little about you

You will start with the basics: your name, gender, birthday, and location. From there, Brightn asks what you want to work toward, what is getting in the way, and what actually matters to you.

Answer your Brightn Zone questions

Next you will answer a quick set of questions across three areas:

• Health: how you are doing physically and mentally
• Wealth: money, work, and feeling stable
• Purpose: what gives your days direction

Together those three make up your Brightn Zone. Your answers turn into a personalized plan with real things you can do. Pick the ones that feel relevant right now and add them as weekly or monthly goals.

Create your account

Once your first plan is set, you will create your Brightn account and verify it with a security code sent to you.

When you get to the membership step, enter your EECS code to unlock your free access. If you do not have your code, ask your mentor and they will get it to you.

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Section 3

Your home screen

Your home screen is home base. It shows you what you are working on today and nothing else you have to think about.

Here you will find:

• Daily Essentials: your mood check-in and journaling prompt for the day
• Your weekly plan: the goals and activities you picked during setup

If you only have a couple of minutes between class, work, or everything else, this is the place to be. Do one Daily Essential and you kept the habit alive. That counts.

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Section 4

Mood check-ins, journaling, and insights

This is the main loop of Brightn: check in, get it out of your head, then look back and see the pattern. It gets more useful the longer you use it.

Watch: mood check-ins, journaling, reflections, and your weekly insights.

Do a mood check-in

A check-in is the fastest way to name how you are feeling and start noticing what keeps showing up. It takes under a minute.

1. Tap Journal, then select Check In.
2. Choose up to three emotions.
3. Rate how strongly you are feeling each one.
4. Pick up to three things that might be behind it.
5. Save it, or keep going into a journal entry if you want to get into it.

Journal and get a reflection back

Your Journal holds your past entries and check-ins, and it is where you start something new.

If you journal right after a check-in, Brightn can offer questions to help you work through what you are feeling, so you are never staring at a blank page. When you save your entry, you get a personalized reflection back. Brightn may also suggest activities you can add straight to your plan.

Your entries are private to you. You can go back and read any of them whenever you want to see what you were working through and what you said back to yourself.

See your insights

Tap Insights to see trends pulled from your own activity in the app.

Your weekly and monthly reports pull together your check-ins and journal entries so you can see how things are actually shifting. Sometimes you are doing better than it feels like, and this is where you find that out.

Track the pattern, not the perfection. Missing a day does not reset anything.

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Section 5

Explore programs and opportunities

Explore is Brightn's library of programs and lessons across Health, Wealth, and Purpose. It is where you go when you want to work on something specific.

Watch: browsing programs, filtering by Brightn Zone, and adding to your plan.

Tap Explore at the bottom of the app. From there you can:

• Browse all available programs
• Filter by Health, Wealth, or Purpose
• Search for a specific topic
• Watch individual lessons
• Add new opportunities to your plan

For example, search stress or burnout and you will see programs built around it. There is real stuff in here on money, work, confidence, and figuring out what is next after graduation. Finishing lessons also earns you points in the app.

You can revisit your Brightn Zone from this area too, and pull in new recommendations whenever your plan stops fitting what you actually need.

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Section 6

Add the Brightn widget

The widget is the easiest way to stay consistent when your days are packed. It puts a mood check-in one tap away, right on your phone's home screen.

Watch: adding the Brightn widget to your home screen.

1. Press and hold an empty area of your phone's home screen.
2. Choose the option to add a widget.
3. Search for Brightn.
4. Add the Brightn widget to your home screen.

Tapping the widget takes you straight into a mood check-in. No opening the app, no hunting through menus.

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Section 7

Your profile and settings

Your profile and settings let you control how Brightn works for you, from how the AI sounds to how often it reminds you to check in.

Watch: personalizing your profile, notifications, and more.

Get to your profile

From the home screen, tap your profile icon in the upper right corner. Your profile gives you a quick view of your activity, including recent check-ins and what you have completed.

From here you can also open your Brightn Zone, explore programs, or add things to your weekly plan.

Open your settings

From your profile, tap the Settings icon in the upper right corner. Everything below lives in this menu.

Customize your Brightn AI

You can rename your Brightn AI and adjust how its responses feel. If the tone is not landing for you, change it. It should sound like something you actually want to hear from.

Update your info

You can edit any of these at any time:

• Name
• Email
• Gender
• Birthday
• About Me
• Occupation

You can also go back to what you shared during setup, including your goals and what you said was hard. Things change fast at this point in your life, so it is worth updating every once in a while.

Manage notifications

Brightn has a few notification types you can turn on or off. Set them for when you would actually want a nudge, not when you are at work or in class. A reminder you ignore is worse than no reminder at all.

Face ID and security

If your phone supports it, you can turn Face ID login on or off from your account settings. Worth doing if other people are around your phone.

Your membership

Open the membership section inside Settings to see the access tied to your account. Your EECS access is free to you.

Check out the Brightn Wall

The Brightn Wall is where you can see other people in the Brightn community. You can get to it from your settings.

Invite someone

Know somebody who could use this? Use the Invite option inside Settings to share Brightn.

Get help

Select Get Help from the settings menu to reach Brightn support with any question about your account. Widget setup instructions are in there too.

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Anytime

Need more help?

Brightn is yours to figure out at your own pace. Come back to these videos whenever you want a refresher, or tap Get Help inside the app if something is up with your account. If you are stuck on getting signed up, your EECS mentor can help.

You do not need to have it all figured out. Start with one honest check-in.