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Volume 9, Number 8: May 2003

Posing Policy Problems in a Web Exercise
AIDS in Africa

by Angela Burger
University of Wisconsin-Marathon

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The problem with policy issues is that they have a dozen sides, not two. How can instructors present the multiple considerations and options, the values and risks, the costs and benefits, the practical and the conceptual? Either class presentations and readings deluge students with so many variables that they find themselves able to criticize anything but propose nothing. Class discussions can be vigorous but the need to bring up so many variables leads to "light bytes" rather than a focused exploration. If the issue deals with a foreign country, instructors face the dilemma of xenoblivious students. If the issue demands knowledge from other disciplines, instructors wrestle with problems of inclusion.

One alternative is to combine a class "core" with an out-of-class interactive web exercise. The web site can provide other essential or desirable components, designed for the purpose.

With the support of the Institute of Global Studies, Dr. Linda Baumann (Prof., School of Nursing, UW-Madison), Dr. Ismail Shariff (Prof., Economics, UW-Green Bay), and Dr. Angela Burger (Prof., Political Science, UW Colleges: Marathon) have developed an exercise for use in multiple courses and at different levels for a significant policy problem: what to do about AIDS in Africa?

The exercise is decisional, forcing students to make successive decisions and reasonable arguments throughout. Recognizing Shulman's contention that learning is least useful when private and hidden and most powerful when public and communal, the exercise incorporates multiple discussion forums, each focused on a segment of the issue. By participating in each forum, students experience a greater variety of reasoned judgments than they would in the classroom. Grading weight must be accorded to discussions.

Each instructor sets the topic(s) for a subsequent paper that is more analytic, applied or theoretic. While the forums ask students to choose and defend policy components, the paper might require a critique of a policy package adopted in an African country, or application of one or more major models to policy options.

What the exercise does is present the perspective of six organizations: a pharmaceutical corporation, the Nurses and Doctors for World Health (an NGO running clinics in Africa), three governments (US, India, generic African state) and a UN committee. The head of each organization seeks advice on what policy to adopt. Not only does each organization have its own agenda, values, concerns, and goals, but the five or six actors within each entity have different positions. After pursuing the range of options in one organization, students go to a discussion board to advocate and explain the policy that organization should adopt.

Then they go to the next organization, where officials offer different arguments, and on to that discussion board. By the time students complete all six organizations, they will have grappled with multiple issues, some more than once. They will have learned that what seemed reasonable at one point might not be acceptable or effective as they progressed.

By the end, students will realize no perfect policy exists that can be accepted, easily implemented, and effective everywhere. They will, however, develop an awareness of existing conditions as well as the desires of different groups and can suggest sophisticated and complex policy packages. Instructors will find students discuss policies with assurance at any time with anyone. Just as important, students will carry over into other assignments a number of lessons learned from the exercise.

The web site contains background information on

  • Plagues - Security impact of plagues has links to Thucydides on Athenian plague, Black Death; etc.
  • HIV/AIDS - Questions on acquisition, diagnosis, treatment, etc., offer a link to answers, and a short quiz.
  • African countries - A clickable map of Africa gives basic data. Case studies on AIDS in specific countries come from NPR, CNN, the World Bank, etc. Articles on the impact of AIDS and basic data on hospitals and doctors per capita, health expenditures, etc., fill out the site.

The exercise helps students overcome facile naiveté. It supplements course goals without overpowering them. It exposes students to African countries, their cultures, and problems with HIV/AIDS.

Constructing This Exercise

We built ordinary web pages, using web editors available. We didn't want students to be printing the pages, so we used a font size that could easily be read on-screen, added a margin, and double spaced between paragraphs.

We tried to confine any official's statement to one screen on our computer. We conceptualized the program as a series of "sideways" links. A position statement uses terms defined on a separate page by a quick link. Explanatory material is reached by links. Color coding identifies links as essential, moderate, and advanced, thus enabling instructors to tailor the exercise for their needs. For example, students in Business-Economics might be assigned more advanced links for the corporation and a government. Nursing students might follow the most advanced links for the "Nurses and Doctors for World Health," but the basic for all others.

If students print the initial page, then they don't have definitions (e.g., what are parallel imports?) and have to do the work again or risk showing ignorance in discussion and on papers.

How much time does the exercise take? Students can read the positions taken by five or six officials in an organization, clicking sideways for basic material, in 45 minutes. Reading and posting for that discussion forum takes 15 to 20 minutes.

The more time-concentrated the discussions, the better. This year we asked students to read and discuss three organizations in four days, and then the other three over five days. They had a week to write a paper. We gave them an initial three days to explore the background links. In a sophomore-level multi-disciplinary course, the biologist taught AIDS; the political scientist examined policy history domestically and introduced an international component. This was the "class core." We asked students to explore "Plagues" and "Africa." Predictably, students asked for an extra three days for the paper, which was granted. The entire exercise was completed in three weeks.

Advice to "New Constructors"

First, what are your learning objectives for the exercise? Second, can you construct it with existing tools or do you need an expert to find or make the software? Third, Is the expectation that the exercise will be solely for your course, any course with that title, or for broader use? If the latter two, limit the time, energy, and weight needed, otherwise it may not be used by others. Other tips:

1. Download and save to file the materials for links. By the time the exercise is up and running, the original link won't work.
2. If you need "fake people" for illustrations, hire a specialist to create them, or seek permissions to use photos of real people. (We're still improving ours.)
3. Do utilize student assistants to search for appropriate materials.
4. Even if you've built a lot of web pages, hire an expert to take your work and create a smoothly functioning exercise, update it to your specs as needed, and re-check links prior to each use.
5. If your class is larger than 40, divide the class into two groups for discussion forums.

Final Word:

What is the url?
AIDS in Africa http://www.uwmc.uwc.edu/political_science/IGS_AIDSinAFRICA/AIDSinAFhomepage.htm

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