Lesson Report:
Title
Predicting Ideology: From Classifying Left/Right to Designing Indirect Polls
Synopsis: This session moved from defining ideology and distinguishing left- vs right-leaning reasoning to applying those distinctions in practice and using them to predict opinions. Students generated ideologically grounded responses to hypothetical university policies and then began designing an indirect polling system to infer student support for an in-person finals policy without asking directly. The overarching objective was to connect classification of beliefs with political-science-style prediction.
Attendance
– Number of students mentioned absent: 0
– Note: Class operated in 5 breakout rooms (~19 participants referenced for grouping).
Topics Covered (chronological)
– Tech check and framing
– Quick AV check; reminder this is (hopefully) the last online session before returning to the large classroom Tuesday.
– Stated goal: deepen understanding of political ideologies (left vs right) and make the leap from explanation to prediction.
– Concept review: ideology and left vs right
– Ideology defined: a system of ideas/beliefs that reveals patterns across individuals.
– Why categorize: helps group similar patterns of belief and, crucially, enables prediction (political scientists aim not only to explain but also to forecast attitudes/behaviors).
– Opening diagnostic writing (individual; Google Form on eCourse)
– Prompt context: AUCA introduces a hypothetical 85% attendance-as-grade policy; a sample student response opposes it (“I’m an adult…results should matter more than butts-in-seatsâ€�).
– Task: Classify the sample response as left-leaning or right-leaning and justify in 2–3 sentences.
– Logistics: Submit via school email if possible; 5 minutes allotted; used to seed group assignments for later activities.
– Clarifications: Students reminded to post questions verbally (chat notifications not seen reliably).
– Group Activity 1: Ideological responses to 3 hypothetical AUCA policies
– Instructions (before breakouts):
– For each policy, produce two distinct student responses:
– One left-leaning rationale.
– One right-leaning rationale.
– Groups free to decide whether each response agrees or disagrees with the policy; focus is the ideological reasoning.
– Policies:
1) Ban sale of all sugary drinks on campus (students can still bring their own).
2) Require at least 20 hours of community service to graduate.
3) One strike and you’re out for plagiarism (immediate expulsion upon first offense).
– Output target: 2 responses per policy (6 total per group).
– Share-out: Policy 1 (sugary drinks) — representative reasoning captured across groups
– Left-leaning rationales (agreement common):
– University bears responsibility to promote student health; reducing access helps students make healthier choices; potential benefits include less obesity/diabetes.
– Institutional environment should nudge better choices (welfare of the community prioritized).
– One group added an equity angle: if access/cost is uneven, removing on-campus sales equalizes on-campus access (acknowledged as an unconventional but arguable equity framing).
– Right-leaning rationales (disagreement common):
– Adults should choose what they consume; it’s not the university’s role to parent students.
– Market/consumer freedom: if a product is legal and for sale, students should be able to buy it on campus.
– Practical inefficacy: students will buy off-campus anyway; policy fails its stated goals while restricting choice.
– Share-out: Policy 2 (community service requirement) — representative reasoning captured across groups
– Left-leaning rationales (agreement common):
– Serves the common good; builds civic responsibility and community connection; helps students graduate with a sense of social duty in addition to knowledge.
– 20 hours over four years is modest; reasonable for cultivating active citizenship and understanding real-world issues.
– Right-leaning rationales (disagreement common):
– Violates individual liberty and time sovereignty; students should decide how to allocate their time.
– Requirement is unrelated to core academic objectives; a libertarian view objects to compelled service, especially when students pay substantial tuition.
– Note: Policy 3 (one-strike plagiarism expulsion) was part of the assignment but not discussed in plenary due to time constraints.
– Instructor’s meta-reminder:
– Distinguish personal opinion from ideological classification. Supporting or opposing a policy is not inherently left or right; it’s the reasoning (common good vs individual liberty, institutional responsibility vs personal choice, etc.) that signals ideology.
– Group Activity 2: Predictive polling design (indirect measurement)
– Policy to predict: All final exams must be in person; permanent removal of online options.
– Task: In groups, design a system to infer whether a student is likely to support or oppose the policy without asking about that policy directly.
– Constraints restated: You cannot ask the direct question; you must use indirect indicators grounded in earlier ideological patterns.
– Deliverable: A practical proxy-measure approach (e.g., question set, indicators, and a scoring/rule for predicting support vs opposition), to be presented next class.
– Logistics: New breakout rooms; ~10 minutes design time; some connectivity/dual-account management handled mid-activity.
– Presentation plan: Groups will present their predictive systems in person next Thursday.
Actionable Items
– Urgent (before next class)
– Prepare presentations: Each group finalizes its indirect polling system for the in-person finals policy (include question list, scoring/rubric, and a brief rationale linking items to ideological indicators).
– Confirm group rosters and responsibilities for presentations (some members had connection issues; ensure everyone knows their role).
– Confirm return to in-person classroom on Tuesday and communicate any last-minute changes.
– Soon (this week)
– Support understanding: Invite students who struggled to distinguish left vs right to office hours; consider distributing a short primer contrasting typical left/right justifications in campus-policy contexts.
– Close the loop on Policy 3 (plagiarism one-strike): Decide whether to collect left/right responses asynchronously or allocate brief class time next session for completion.
– Archive opening Google Form responses; reconcile any entries lacking school emails.
– Longer-term
– Build a class bank of archetypal left/right rationales drawn from Activity 1 for use in future prediction exercises.
– Consider a short formative check (quiz or in-class sort) to ensure students can classify reasoning (not just positions) as left or right.
Homework Instructions:
NO HOMEWORK
All tasks were in-class only—e.g., the opening Google Form “won’t be graded,� the policy-response work was done in breakout rooms, and for the final activity the instructor said “we’re going to take the next 10 minutes… to come up with your system� and that presentations would happen “next Thursday… in person,� with no request to continue the work after class.