I have enjoyed "collaborating" this way -- I think Pierre ought to be very thrilled by this use of the feedback system. Many people here at omidyar.net do not like the system very much, but I think it's fabulous in it's simplicity. I am now adapting the new "tagging" system to give specificity to feedback (see how I tagged this discussion +interesting5? that means I gave the thread 2^5 = 32 points because I feel it's interesting [I'm simply using slashdot labels]). I hope your interest in this "method" of evaluating content will be rewarding for all of us!

:D nmw

nmw said:

that means I gave the thread 2^5 = 32 points

How the heck do you give anything more than one point at a time? I haven't used the system much because I refuse to click 32 times. =)

Simply drink more coffee and get click-happy.

You need o.crack for that!

;P nmw

It would be great to get some outside feedback (and possily some outside help!)

:)

(sp) possibly

if you click on the date of a post, then you'll see an "edit" link, which you can use to fix typos.

:) nmw

what is the timeline on the voting/feedback process to pick your winner?

Thanks guys!

People involved in incredible projects around the world tell me I'm funny. I find this acceptable.

Also, everyone is smarter than me. I find this acceptable as well, even if I cry uncontrollably about it over a plate of cookies every night.

Draining my bank into this topic to proliferate cookie consumption.

Evvy Bryning said:

what is the timeline on the voting/feedback process to pick your winner?

Students are giving me preliminary presentations in class June 4,6,8. We're having final presentations of the finalist projects in class June 12. I need to pick the finalist by the weekend of June 9,10. Finalist will be picked by some combination of who I like and who o.net likes, and possibly some other criteria. Winning team on June 12 will be chosen by my panel of judges .

Judges as yet to be determined. Lots of requests out. Lots of 'too busy' responses. If you happen to know someone in the SF bay area who would be a good judge (like a foundation program manager) =) then let them/me know we should talk.

I refuse to click 32 times

Note that you don't have to wait for the screen to refresh. If you click fast enough on the little "+", the screen will stay there and it will register a point for aproximately every 2.263 clicks.

But be careful you don't wiggle the mouse and start clicking the "-" by mistake!

see also: o.net anonymous -- THE support group for feedback junkies

;D nmw

James,

Thanks to you and your students for sharing your course work with us. Don’t be too hard on the dreamers, you never know what they might do.

I’ve been following these threads with especial interest because once upon a time some equally quixotic people at UCSC hit up my family to give them a ridiculously large, half-baked scheme called Merrill College . How screwy was that?

I detect in your class threads a lot of the same bizarro optimism. Please keep it coming, you Slugs!

Social: They asked my family what they should study there. We told them to study whatever they wanted to study. They decided to study poverty, foreigners in the Third World, Hispanics and exotic stuff like that. Then they decided it would be even wackier if they actually brought in students from those backgrounds to study there.

Econ: They’d started building it before they had anywhere near the money to finish it. How much did they need? They asked us for $500,000. We gave them $650,000 for starters.

Technology: Somebody had the wild idea to teach students classes where they lived. Architecture for the win!

Obstacles: Inviting Timothy Leary was a little hard to do since he was a felon at the time.

From some early campus history on the controversial campus activities that brought us our first tangible return on invested capital:

“McHenry: Well I think if they do so as individuals, it's up to them. I think it's unfortunate when they represent themselves as coming from the University. It's bad in public relations and substantially in effect it ...take the grape boycott -- I have a tremendous emotional sympathy and great personal admiration for Cesar Chavez, and no grapes have been served at our table for more than a year ... and yet when Peter Braun, now at Merrill, organized this park-in at Lucky's and some of the other markets, it tripled the sale of table grapes in Santa Cruz.

[Extra--bite--the--hand--that--feeds--you--LOL! My family was leading the planet in sales of table grapes at the time, thanks to a retail deal in the boondocks of California that my great-grandfather botched and then got stuck holding the bag. Today we call that ill-planned adventure Safeway. While my family was funding some of the first Latin American Studies programs anywhere, Cesar Chavez was picketing us all the time. :-D ]

“And they generated an enormous amount of ill will towards the University. And when I say this to Peter, he says, "Well, we're making converts; in the long haul it's going to do some good." But really all they've done is get rid of a certain amount of their own aggression and frustration. They haven't helped the cause any. If they'd go out and work on Saturdays and contribute the money they earn to the strike fund, it would be a lot more constructive in my opinion. And I can't believe that they're so stupid not to see this.

“Calciano: But yet they're not doing it.

“McHenry: No. Well they... this park-in and all was just calculated to get the dander up of people, of very moderate people who might have been sympathetic if things had been handled politely. Shave off the beards and dress like human beings, and hand out circulars in town and ... but obstructing sidewalks and filling up parking lots with their jalopies and all this is just calculated to make people detest them. And I can't understand it; perhaps it's because I never studied abnormal psychology.”

Oh how I miss the '60s!

I think it's great that you've encouraged your class to do their planning and brainstorming in this open forum. I've offered suggestions to one group with hopes that a) I provide some useful ideas; and b) some of the students make the leap from a class assigment to contributing their time and talent to real world projects that are already in place.

I hope your example encourages professors in other colleges and universities to bring their students into on-line forums like this.

Daniel F. Bassill said:

I think it's great that you've encouraged your class to do their planning and brainstorming in this open forum. I've offered suggestions to one group with hopes that a) I provide some useful ideas; and b) some of the students make the leap from a class assigment to contributing their time and talent to real world projects that are already in place.

I hope your example encourages professors in other colleges and universities to bring their students into on-line forums like this.

I certainly hope that 100% of the students will take away enough from the class that at the right time in their future lives they see a place that a small action by them can make a big change in the world and that they take the opportunity. I don't expect them to all devote their lives primarily to world good, but I do hope that say 5% of them are sufficiently inspired that they go on to do so.

In terms of inspiring other universities. I always think big. I've been at UCSC for two years. This class is step one on the path to building a Social Entrepreneurship degree program at UCSC. This class took one year to get on the books. I roughly envision a draft plan for a whole new degree by next year, and approval by the university 2 years after that. As far as I know there is not a similar undergraduate degree at any major US university. They are primarily sub-groups in business schools. Building that program at a high profile place like "University of California" I hope is enough of a catalyst that it becomes standard fair at all universities. Every college has computer science and economics and sociology. In 20 years I want every college to be educating people in 'How to Change the World'.

Interestingly, I originally thought "Social Entrepreneurship is so hot that some ex-dot-com is going to fund the whole she-bang!". I still think this, and I chose to teach at UCSC against other more prestigous schools exactly because of proximity to silicon valley. However, I've just spent all quarter telling my students "Dont rely on government or foundation grants, build a sustainable business that is profitable!" It finally sunk in that I need to rethink my own plans for a degree program so that they are not falling into this same trap of needing to beg for money to get anything done. Its the great thing about this job - you teach the students, and they teach you.

I want to say thanks to all the outside feedback posters have given, it helps remind me that there is a real world out there.

James Davis said:

I certainly hope that 100% of the students will take away enough from the class that at the right time in their future lives they see a place that a small action by them can make a big change in the world and that they take the opportunity. I don't expect them to all devote their lives primarily to world good, but I do hope that say 5% of them are sufficiently inspired that they go on to do so.

My goal is that young people learn that they can make changes in the world now, and that they need to stay involved, rather in direct social service, or by the way they support those services from their business or professional lives, if significant progress is to be made to overcome major issues that have been identified by your class.

I encourage you to view a wiki that I've launched with the help of a NetImpact volunteer who has been working with me since January. She's a 2nd year student a the University of Chicago Graduate School of Business. It can be found at http://boardfellow.wikispaces.co m/

As universities set up schools to teach these concepts, they have the potential to use their teaching as a part of solving the problems that they are teaching kids to think about. The Business School Connection is just one way that students can make a huge difference in the way the social sector operates.

Many of the feedback from the outside community, o.net, was awesome and I appreciated how you guys showed your interests in our work. Thank you for all the great feedback, it was great hearing your opinions and how it related to many of your projects. Thanks once again. :)

Darn it!

I kept waiting and waiting to vote, keeping my eyes peel for more/new info -- and then I missed it!! :(

I would have voted for for the bike program, prisoner education and some of the ride-sharing programs (e.g. cruz pool and/or ez ride). I think my major reservation about many proposals is that they aspire to solve too much (with too little resourse). I would think it would be better to take the goals "down a notch" and also/instead to focus more on how such projects might be built on a more collaborative foundation -- i.e. "bringing in partners".

I think a hurdle in the implementation of the voting (for me) were workspaces that were too long to read and also threads that seemed to meander of onto tangents -- such lack of focus increases uncertainty -- and uncertainty is very bad when trying to make a decision.

But I guess the primary reason I didn't vote was that I was extremely tired last night and turned in pretty early -- and so I slept through it.

I think I checked -- but I'm not sure: would it have been possible for me to change my vote? Oh, Yes! What a klutz!! Oh, well....

;D nmw

I also felt a little overwhelmed by the amount to read - perhaps a page with 1 paragraph synopses would have been helpful. I had wanted to participate and also missed the deadline.

I look forward to hearing more about the results and reading about the projects.

nmw said:

I think a hurdle in the implementation of the voting (for me) were workspaces that were too long to read and also threads that seemed to meander of onto tangents -- such lack of focus increases uncertainty -- and uncertainty is very bad when trying to make a decision.

A - You will get another chance in a finalist round. Details soon.

B - I took a note that one paragraph abstracts will be required next year.

C - Feasible projects will also be required next year.

Sorry, but I was on vacation when you voted. But I really hope that you do this again with another class. I think I got as much out of it as the students.

Evvy Bryning said:

Sorry, but I was on vacation when you voted. But I really hope that you do this again with another class. I think I got as much out of it as the students.

Offered again next spring quarter. Lots of plans for how to improve things.