Early thoughts about Loomio & the college classroom

In the last post of early thoughts about Loomio, I found that there were advantages to the way that Loomio lets groups plan, deliberate, and vote. I also concluded that there were limiting factors on Loomio or consensus-based decision making due to the realities of accountability, access, and bullying.

In this post, I'd like to consider Loomio as it might be implemented in the college classroom. The college classroom seems at first like it could resolve some of the limiting factors surrounding Loomio.

• Accountability: A college classroom typically guarantees accountability through grades (this is a bit discipline-and-punish), but also through the internal motivation of college students. It's an open question whether kids these days are too distracted for internal motivation, or whether kids these days will appreciate their ability to multitask through Loomio.
• Access: Colleges like to show off capital investments, so college classrooms and dorms typically have internet connectivity. Whether or not the students inside those college classrooms possess the self-efficacy to use those connections to engage with Loomio is unresearched.
• Bullying: Time Magazine recently had a cover story about rape on college campuses. That is to say, it's a major, national problem that colleges are hostile to vulnerable populations. So I won't assume that any college is free from a culture of harassment.

Despite these continuing reservations, we could still say, Presuming that colleges clean up their acts, can we implement Loomio in the classroom? The question about implementing Loomio in the classroom is really the same as any other such question: Should we do XYZ in the classroom? In all of these cases, the answer begins with another question: Does XYZ help you meet your learning objectives?

There've been a lot of cool technologies that I've thought about implementing in classes. I abstained in most cases because, for example, I didn't understand what skill my students would develop by using git instead of Carmen. (Apologies to Jentery Sayers, whose git piece I haven't yet read.) Above all, I don't want to be chasing trends or approval like a "cool dad."

In the composition classroom, the learning objectives typically include semi-professionial communication skills. In the survey or Shakespeare classroom, there's no such learning objective. There's no learning objective that necessitates the implementation of Loomio.

Nevertheless, there are many procedural issues that arise in the classroom that typically require an impromptu poll, or a quick discussion. I typically resolve these problems in meatspace, with all of the problems that follow: students who are sick that day miss out on the discussion, students who are in the back of the class miss out on the discussion, students who are shy miss out on the discussion, etc. In these cases of impromptu revisions to the syllabus, I can see how Loomio could be a fairer, more democratic way of reaching decisions. That's not a resounding endorsement, which is unfortunate (for trend-chasers) because Loomio seems like a really well-designed package.

Lastly, there is an easily applied way of resolving this question. In the first week of class, use Loomio itself to propose the question to the class: Should we use Loomio to make decisions about the conduct of the class? If the class accepts the proposal, then it's settled; you've got everyone registered. If the class doesn't accept the proposal, then you may have met your learning objectives anyway.