wrap: Peeragogy Innovations Pilot 1

[Joe Corneli]

Yesterday we concluded the (first) Peeragogy Innovations Pilot course.

Although Tufts Experimental College didn't accept the full course for presentation Autumn 2020, I think it's safe to say that our online community got a lot out of the small-scale pilot. We relaxed all kinds of requirements from the course syllabus. Instead of keeping a diligent schedule of readings and discussions, most people read and shared just a bit for their turn.  The basic idea to have everyone do their own readings and focus the course time on sharing what we each learned seems to have worked very well.

Instead of challenging collaborative projects in the community, we had some small-scale adventures together.  A particular highlight was the screening and discussion of a short film "The Crossing" about trafficking and modern day slavery.  In this session we got to know folks involved with the Co-op University and Johnathan Worth of Think HubBub who facilitated the screening.  Thanks to Chris Meadows for setting this up!

I had hoped that the seminar-style Thursday sessions would proceed in tandem with hands on collaborative writing sessions to improve the Handbook.  That too was more fitful than disciplined, but we did often meet on Mondays to check in about Handbook progress.  My next goal here is to convert the book to a Tufte layout.  We also made progress on a paper for Futures; work continues there.  Many TODO items remain for the Handbook, going back (at least) to Roland's reading group, which inspired the Pilot Course.

As an endorsement of the basic Peeragogical Innovations course model, Charlie and Charlotte are intending to meet next week to discuss Pilot 2!  That meeting will take place on Thursday April 2.  Note that the timezone differences will reset then, details for the meeting will be announced closer to the date.