Proposal to meet scalability of Instructors: LONG POST

Following is a copy of an email I sent in as a counter idea to the Vouchers idea.

I am sorry that I was not able to attend the Instructor meeting in-world regarding Linden Labs plan regarding educational vouchers. Today I managed to have time to read over the forum transcript twice to make sure that I clearly understand all the points of views expressed. The concept of vouchers is an interesting one, and I'll admit that the idea would have some merit under some strict environmental circumstances. The idea has some major fallacies regarding other policies of Linden Lab.

Firstly with the account registration being reduced to have no checks, players could make unlimited numbers of Alt accounts and use those alts to boost up the payment that their friends recieved via classes. This would be an UNLIMITED supply with how current registration systems are currently implimented. This would encourage the Instructor group system to get gamed by an even larger percentage than what the current ammounts are. By the nature of capitalism if you tie the reward for teaching so closely to the exact numbers in attendance this would also encourage behavior from a fair ammount of Instructors that is less than benificial to the students. The voucher system brought up would have an additional side effect of even more grossly inflating the current circulation of $L in the economy. Linden Lab has made it know that they wish to control the "fountains" for currency. They have even removed many of the "addiction sources" of income that keep peoples desire to be in game. This one voucher system would completely undo all those financial benifits by creating a single source that would introduce and even higher influx of currency and it would be putting that money into the hands of people that it would have less of an increase in enjoyment. This is beyond the fact that the idea outright emotionall offends a lot of Instructors who teach very well organized and instructional classes. New players with vouchers will see them as a limited resource. Something to tightly hold onto for fear that the voucher will be wasted. There is no method at all in a virtual world to have a reputation system that can be accurate and trusted enough, without possibility of being 'gamed' that it would help discern good Instructors from bad.

That covers the basis of reasons for why a voucher system would be counter productive to the economy, counter productive to the quality of teaching and counter productive to preventing players from taking advantage of the system. The voucher system would have the advantage of reducing Linden Labs manpower needed to maintain and police the Instructors, though.it is not the only method. My proposal that would cover all the bases is as follows:

1. Instructors must be approved. This means their rapsheet needs to be clean. They must have been a resident in SL for at least 3 months. Regardless of account age at time of applicate the previous 2 months must be ABSOLUTELY CLEAN of any administrative action against them. This includes a clean abuse report rapsheet and no financial mishaps if a paying subscriber. If at -Any Time- after being accepted an Instructor recieves any administrative action this should automatically remove them from ALL volunteer groups and must wait 2 months to reapply. If it is a major infraction they should be permanantly banned from all volunteer groups. This will maintain at least some level of maturity and ensure the general mentality is of a level we wish LL to be associated with.

2. Instructors must use an approved class. This means that they must write up a class title and description to be submitted for approval. The new twist on this is that _All_ approved classes will generate a unique 'approved class ID number'. Linden Labs will also maintain a set of pre-approved class descriptions that have publically available class IDs any Instructor is allowed to use. These Linden classes would need very general descriptions that cover a range of information in a topic. It is a _Must_ that the descriptions not be specific enough to hinder creative thought by the Instructor. Instructors should not be forced to use these but only have them available.

3. Instructors must use an approved area. This means that they must teach the class at a Linden Owned instruction area or it must be taught at an area that is currently PAYING a listing fee as an "Educational Area". This can be an option added to 'About Land' similar to the normal listing checkbox. The reason for this restriction is that areas flagged as "Educational Area" will have special handling to record timestamps of when avatars enter or leave the land parcel. (this is meaningful below).

4. Instructors must schedule their classes in events. This means we need a SPECIAL option for submitting Instructor certified classes that are SEPERATE from non Instructor run classes in the Find option. We need a page at secondlife.com/volunteer set up to do this in an automatic manner. We need to be able to set a class to be automatically reoccuring at the same hour/day without having to manually list it again. The page would need for us to enter the Unique ClassID number and to choose a location from the Linden Official areas or one of the areas we have submitted for approval previously. All Linden Official and our privately choosen teaching areas need to be in a menu for quick selection. We would set a timeframe for the class to be listed. The class would REQUIRE us to submit the event at least 4 hours prior to the event in order to be eligible for pay. Setting one with less than 4hrs warning will be allowed but will alert the Instructor it will not be eligible for payment. This allows instructors who dont care about money to still use the system to teach classes using the Event listing if the opportunity arises.

5. Instructors must submit class information for automated payment within 24 hrs of class completion. This would NOT be the current email system. This would need to be a web page somewhere in the secondlife.com/volunteer area specifically for class submittals. The instructor would be able to use the page listed in item 4 above to click on a link to a posted class. They would then have a page automatically filled out with the ClassID, Location and Time. If for some reason there was a sim issue and they had to perform the class somewhere else they need to be able to change the location and timeframe values. Its quite possible for a class to run over time and although they wont get paid more its useful for a reason to be mentioned below. There would also be a value to enter the number of students who attended the class. They would need to EXACTLY enter the names of the avatars who attended.

As said above land listed for 'Educational Area' purposes would track a log of who was in an area. This record would be maintained in the system so that at any time the last 2 days of activity would be accessible. The avatar names entered by the instructor would be referenced against this list _Automatically_ by the database system to verify that the name listed was in the class area for at least 66% of the duration of the class. This time frame gives leaveway for connection problems while still preventing a single student from being able to benifit more than one instructor. In order to qualify for payment at least 5 of the submitted names would need to be recognized as valid students who were known to be in the area for the class. The lindens could impliment any choice of measures so that invalid names entered could enable "potential abuse" warning flags on the Instructor so that they would be more likely for future "auditing" of the class. If the people submitted passed the requisite the 500$L could be immediately credited to the Instructors account.
Since the Instructor must click a link for a class they already have posted that link would not be valid after payment recieved thus there could be no accidental double submitting and the accompanying double payment. Since the areas do a proof of attending students there would no longer be any means to lie about people in attendance cutting out illegitimate payments.

The web interface and automation would mean that the only labor required by Linden Lab employees would be limited to approving custom class descriptions. The employees could have a tool to generate unique Class ID values so that would be very little work. The entire system to list events and manage class / payment submital would be automated. With extra time the Lindens in charge of verifying classes would be able to do random audits of classes in progress to show up and occasionally verify the class currently happening is what was posted. The system could flag Instructors automatically who schedule classes and do not submit attendance reports. I would also add one more policy to the Instructor group. Any instructor found out to be cheating the system and submitting fraudulant class information will be IMMEDIATELY responsible for automatically refunding all payments EVER recieved as an Instructor. This policy could be enforced on a case by case basis but the act of having it a published policy that has the 'threat' of being enforced will discourage someone from trying to find a way through all the failsafes i've already thouht of.

The end result will be that the Instructor group of volunteers have a fast, easy, friendly and automated method of both scheduling classes and su bmitting for payment. Payment itself will be quicker. The web interface will have the menu's to quickly enter the info for convienence. Linden Labs will have a system in place that can easily scale to population numbers much higher than what we expect in the next year. The ammount of 'menial' work on the employees in charge of the Instructor group will be reduced allowing for more time for attending (auditing) classes to verify quality assurance. The time spent in these random audits can be used to give these instructors friendly advice or even assistance. It will simultaneously give the employees time to LEARN more themselves. And finally it will have the BEST economic impact by removing nearly all methods to cheat the system and will mean a lot lower $L influx into circulation helping to stabalize economic impact.

Interesting.

I can see potential in mosf of this and only have issue with 2 parts:

Part #3. I have a sim that exists on the premise that we will hold classes there. It is not Linden land. It would be wrong, in my eyes, to insist that all teaching for pay be held on Linden land. Perhaps, certain non-Linden lands could also be approved for teaching and the safeguards you suggest could be put into place.
There are many sims or plots of land in SL that host or are centered around educational activities and classes.. to ask them to move to Linden land is inconvenient and sometimes not practical. Its like having a lake next to your house with a dock and someone making the rule that you have to put your boat in a lake 2 miles down the road.

I am totally against having to pay to teach... regardless of whether it is a fee to post the event or advertise it or any other such gimmick. There is no reason for it. It clouds the purpose of teaching.. to disseminate information and give people a boost in life, Second or Real.

An automated system would be wonderful. I never remember to submit the paperwork. I suppose if I had I would be at least $20K richer.

You're right. I only mentioned the payment as a side thought to begin with so I edited that sentence out of the proposal.




Oh wow ! Actually that was not my intent at all. I by no means think classes should be FORCED to be held on Linden land. Only that there be MULTIPLE class areas maintained by Linden Labs *in case* a player does not have land of their own.

To clarify:

My intention is that players will always have the option of scheduling their classes on these Linden Owned parcels but they will also have the ability to submit OTHER parcels of land to be places to hold their classes. The player would need to own this other land or be a member of the group assigned to the land. The land would need to have selected a "Educational Area" checkbox in its About Land information dialog. This could be free or it could be a 30$ listing fee similar to the current listing service that is available. My *Personal* preference would be that if either of the two check boxes are selected you get charged the listing fee but you do not get charged twice if both are selected.

The reason for this listing requirement is that this flag would be what is used to let the system know it needs to track avatars entering and leaving the parcel in order to verify everyone the Instructor later submits when filing for payment. Since sim issues can cause problems, a class might need to move to a different area unexpectantly, or any of a thousand other 'things' might happen, the land would need to continuously be tracking the avatars and not just during scheduled events. After all we dont want to punish an instructer where their class starts 20 minutes late but still lasts the full duration with a full set of players in attendance.

So yes privately owned sims are perfectly fine and I had no intention of making it appear they should be discluded. This 'education area' flag could be set by any land owner on a parcel 512m2 in size or larger. We could even add a checkbox on the main map so that Education parcels get a book icon floating over them similar to the $ for parcels for sale.

Sojourner id appreciate your response with this clarification and removal of the event listing fee.

63 'views' and only one person has anything to say?

Seronis--there are a lot of ideas that I like in your proposal. (Some I came up with independently in my proposal.) So when considering my critiques below, please keep in mind that I generally think you are on the right track.



This is absolutely correct--and is my greatest problem with LL's proposal. The voucher system is far more apt to be gamed than the current system. Though the Community Team doesn't control how accounts are generated, it is vital that they take this into account. (It may be that in this case, that the Community Team had finished their Voucher proposal before learning about the changes to the account sign-up system were to be made.)



I disagree here. Anyone can Abuse Report anyone else for darn near anything. It's like being sued in the US. Lots of people have ARs filed against them that are utterly illegitimate. And unfortunately some slip though on to the AV's record--the Community Team is just too overloaded to be able to do the kind of through due process investigations that we would ideally have.

Because of this, such a requirement could as easily be gamed as the current account registration system. Don't like an Instructor? Create a free alt, harass them until they snap, and then file an AR.



Class approval is already required. I take it the 'approved class ID' will enable better tracking, so that unapproved classes don't slip though and get paid?



Not a bad idea, as long as the "Educational Areas" are not limited to approved schools. I know you didn't suggest that, but it has been suggested, and I just want to go on record again that such a rule would be A Very Bad Idea.



This would save me a hell of a lot of work each week. To make this work well, there should also be a way to accommodate third-party class posting for Instructors (like we do at NCI.) On the other hand, while it is a neat idea, I'm not sure it would help LL solve their problems with the current system.



These two items sound like a lot of extra work for little benefit.

If the system is automated, then why does LL care when the claim for the class is submitted? Some timely submission requirement makes sense from a purely technical perspective--say within the amount of time the "Events" history is kept for.

Why does the Instructor have to enter the names of the AV's who attended? According to your next paragraph, LL already has this information? It's just extra work for the Instructor, and an extra chance to screw up (especially considering some of the weird last names in SL.)



Since the system is only recording AV keys at specific places during specific times, we are talking about a very small amount of data. Why a two day window?



This all sounds good. Very similar to my proposal.



Not necessary. LL's system knows how many AVs were in attendance and for how long. The class is either eligible for payment or it is not.



Why? If the Instructor does not want to be paid, why should LL care? Why should anyone care?



That's too harsh. I would suggest that they just be dismissed from the Instructor program.

Hi All,

Great to see all the discussion around this issue. There are some excellent points in this thread about avatar attendence verification among other things. Our current priorities at this time are:

* Automation of Payment Claim processing
* Rethinking the Instructor application process (do we need to raise the bar to make it more difficult to become an instructor in the first place?)
* Finding better ways to connect students with educational events via expanded listings or a special LL-sponsored educational events section in the Finder

Here's something I tried to post last night, but started having interweb issues that prevented me from doing so:

In the following, I refer to my post... here's a quick link to it: /208/78/113770/1.html

1. "Instructors must be approved."
- I agree on this point, and have expressed my thoughts on this on a couple other threads. I do agree about clean rapsheets, but some of your requirements seem a bit harsh on the surface. I'm not sure that missing a payment is quite so relevent, especially when their rapsheet is spotless otherwise. And, since Instructors can end up being easy targets for dishonest people, I think it should take multiple complaints within a certain timeframe before their Instructor status is revoked.

2. "Instructors must use an approved class."
- I agree on the main point here, but I can't say I'm too fond of all your ideas. The system, as it currently stands, could easily be at least partially automated. With the help of the Lindens (primarily Lucy, I assume), we could compile lists of required aspects of classes being submitted for approval. For example, there's Building, Scripting, SL Business, SL Art, Vehicles, Machinima, Modelling, DJ'ing, etc. To elaborate further this particular idea, what I just layed out isn't necessarily how I expect it would happen; essentially, we'd attempt to isolate the various points the Lindens look for when reviewing class approvement applications.

3. "Instructors must use an approved area."
- I mostly disagree. I believe the freedom to use the land of your choosing is part of what helps the program as it currently exists to be successful. Sure, Linden owned land could probably be *slightly* easier for students to find, but then you have to worry about overcrowding (resulting in noise, grief, and sim crashes), MORE work for the Lindens, *and* it would end up costing LL more than it would be worth. (I don't believe LL is a mega-rich company.. anyone who wishes to argue that please private message me, or point me to another forum thread).
- However, we could consider having land approved as "Educational" as an option. (this is something I address--in a different manner--in my post, and have had very good (but not necessarily supportive) feedback relating to it.)

4. "Instructors must schedule their classes in events."
- This is similar to part of my proposal.

5. "Instructors must submit clas information for automated payment..."
- Submission of class information for payment is something that we're trying to get rid of. I believe automation of this particular thing would be a very unnecessary step. If we're going to automate, I truly feel there's a way to do it where it makes things easier on EVERYONE (not just Lindens), *and* maintains (or even strengthens) the quality of education.

After this I couldn't hold my attention span any longer
Please compare your ideas to mine. I can feel the collaborative effort starting to really take motion, which is wonderful. If we can continue in this manner, we'll mould a solid, functional, and very agreeable system.

PS- after reading your reply to The Sojourner, what you're talking about for #3 looks even more similar (and slightly compatible) to my idea.

I love critiques and criticism so no worries =-)
Ok so its not a quote but so what. My point was that filing an AR against someone doesnt dirty their "permanant record" at all. Only when an abuse team is forced to take action against you because you have actually DONE something and its been proven through investigation does your rapsheet get a mark against you. Someone filing 200 ARs against you for false claims still leaves you clean, and them a rapsheet mark for slander etc. Id like your comment on this Carl to see if you agree or not with explaining it a bit more in detail.
Yup, if you have a full fledged ClassID value you use when posting the event through the website the database itself can use that ID value in order to fill out the description in the event. Its to simplify things for everyone involved so management is easier.
Dear (insert deity name of choice here) no. I dont endorce schools in general as organized bodies. If LL wants to add another registration option so institutions can be formalized, and so that instructors could ON THEIR OWN register themselves as being members of said institution granting that institution the right to schedule classes on behalf of the instructor fine. But personally i think with easy to use automated methods that PAY the instructor, said instructor should do it themselves. I wont argue against it but just not pushing FOR it either. And BY NO MEANS should instructors be forced to affiliate with a school. Thats just ludicrous.
The reason the instructor must file within 24hrs is they obviously already have enough time to teach the event, at some point while writing out their lecture they can use a ntoecard to write the names of the people actively attending class. This is part of being responsible.

The reason the server keeps the last 48hrs of traffic is to keep the STORAGE of the system at a fairly constant level. With the limit being 48hrs of tracking then issues of the grid being down, website being down or other technical issues means that a report that wasnt CAPABLE of being submitted on time is not punished. Its just a little buffer to make things run smoother. I'm very opinionated on both of these times being exactly as stated. Its better for all involved as it lets the system have the lowest possible resource hit on while still providing all the information needed to verify attendance.

The reason the instructor needs to list people by name is so that an instructor can not 'game' the system by ONLY scheduling classes in locations that are KNOWN to have high traffic. It encourages honestly. And it means that people they dont notice who just 'happen' to be in the area will not benifit them. If the system ONLY looks at the names provided and makes sure on a case by case basis that each avatar listed was in the area for the time i said above it helps ensure the system is not giving money to undeserving ripoff artists who use the Instructor program as an easy stipend with no monthly fee. I just loathe people who abuse things. I'm adamant about all issues regarding time limits and explicite names.
Along with what i said immediately above its not specific times. Those land parcels will at all times record traffic. A class may HAVE to start an hour early or hour late or even move to a totally different legitimate area thats not currently in use. Thus we need all legitimate areas to at all times maintain traffic records so that we can prove the students were in the same area as the Instructor, regardless of which area that may be. This point of mine was geared to reduce the impact of system failure and sim lag from keeping a LEGITIMATE instructor from being paid. As much as i dislike ripoff artists i want to protect people from things out of their control.
It will sound like the proposal from anyone who thinks the issue through from all sides and tries to cover the basics of preventing fraud while protecting the innocent. I've seen your opinions and actions and know you're one of the people who DO think about situations from a lot of prospectives. But the email I sent to LL was sent prior to you making your post so the similarities werent intentional. That and it also requires no in-world objects from anyone. No vouchers. No boxes. No recorders. Nothing that has any opportunity to be exploited via the normal in-world methods. I wanted to avoid those at all costs.
Not exactly. My point for this is that if the Instructor is entering valid names of people who exist but were no where near the class, this 'could' be a person trying to rip off the system. If the same Instructor does this repeatedly then they are definately trying to game the system. No automatic punishment should be performed by activating some ty pe of 'alart' status on an individual instructor could be benificial to LL by raising the persons chance for random audit. A godmode Liason checking in on a scheduled event might notice other things they are doing to try to cheat, thus raising the stakes that we get RID of someone that doesnt deserve to be an Instructor.
Similar to above it should only make note that the situation happened, and only on repeatedly happen should it raise a warning. If an Instructor is scheduling classes, thus making the Events get listed, and then NOT SHOWING UP to teach this will frustrate new and old residents who place an extra ammount of trust when looking up Instructor Certified classes. As i said above any event posted by an Instructor should be its own category. It should NOT BE in with all the other posted events. It should be special as a means of rewarding volunteers who contribute to the game as a whole. Someone not living up to THEIR end of this system needs audited and removed.

Now if a random audit occurs and the instructor is THERE (or a replacement) and the class is going on as planned then no action should be taken. But people with a history of posting events that they dont also follow through with are doing a Bad Thing.
Not too harsh by any means. They volunteered. They did not have to be an instructor. They are getting special payment that non instructors dont recieve. They would be getting special notice with their own Events category for more visibility. Violating this trust should not be dealt with on any means. Personally if i OWNED second life i would outright ban the individual. Not suspend. Not simply dismiss or recoup the funds. I would eject from the entire community as this is a huge violation of responsibility and trust. Thats me. Not everyone is me, so the suggestion i posted doesnt follow my own desire. Yeah Compromise !!! =-) They deserve no benifit at all if they ever violate their special PRIVLEDGE of being an Instructor.

I only said rapsheet spotless. Not complaints. An Abuse Report is not a mark on your rapsheet. An investigation that results in the abuse team taking action against you from a verbal warning to suspension is a mark on your record. Everyone seems to be misunderstanding what i meant by rapsheet so I should have worded my original post more clearly. I wont edit it as that would only confuse people reading your complaints but i believe i've clarified the issue.

The list of 'linden approved' classes as i stated above would have VERY general guidelines. To the point it would only be conceptual aspects and not exact material. I did express this in my original post so just making sure you understand that is covered. Classes submitted by instructors though may cover a broader range of topics as they may tie different features in to teach one core 'concept' of their own that is not as simple. Any submitted class that is still educational in general should get approved. I dont want the standards stricter.

In every single one of my posts i made it clear that classes can be taught on privately owned land. The only limitations was on size (already a requirement) and on checking an 'educational area' box in About Land by the lands owner. This checkbox is a REQUIREMENT so that the system knows it needs to track visitor history on a given parcel as part of the automated validation process.

We DO NOT want to get rid of instructors submitting information. The ONLY aspect we want to automate is the payment process so that Linden Labs does not feel compelled to mutilate our beloved system in order to lower their costs. The various concepts i outlined above work together as a single thing to reduce the workload required by LL while maintaining the Instructors ability to teach what and where they please. In order to allow this degree of freedom we need methods of tracking and for the reasons i listed while replying to Carl that includes an instructor taking a couple 'moments' to write down names.

This takes seconds out of a class. Its fairly trivial. In my own classes i have always copied the names of avatars and submitted them with my class for payment. I figured that if Lucy was ever required to audit a class, providing names might help reduce her workload so that she can do it quickly and get back to the tedious task of making sure we are all paid. We all like being paid, right? hehehe

Rebuttals welcome. There still may be areas where I worded things where *I* understanded my intent but others may not have. Please critisize to your hearts content and I will explain further as issues arise.

Thank you for responding Jesse, its always great to see the admins take a personal hand in encouraging discussion on a topic. That said:

* Rethinking the Instructor application process (do we need to raise the bar to make it more difficult to become an instructor in the first place?)

I dont know that there is a way to 'raise the bar'. I haven't provided a way to do this and honestly cant think of one that doesnt require man-hours on the administrative side. I mean part of the application process COULD require that you are already teaching a class. And that as time permits a Liason on duty would need to take an hour out of their Live Help duties to sit in while in god-mode (undetectable). Honestly they could do this WHILE answering live help calls as a kind of double tasking (sorry if this increases anyones stress or workload). If it double dutied with LH then it wouldnt be that big of an increase but its the only way i can think of at all to have any assurance of quality.

* Finding better ways to connect students with educational events via expanded listings or a special LL-sponsored educational events section in the Finder

Covered above. All instructor events should be automatically posted as the instructor schedules the event via the web page. They should be in their own section when searching too. Please? =)

I've been lurking in this thread for a few days but hadn't replied yet. But if you are asking for feedback, I'll post my thoughts here now. A lot of your ideas look sensible and viable to me, Seronis, though I share similar criticisms as Soj and Carl.




I am in complete agreement with you regarding the huge potential and increased incentive to abuse with vouchers, alts, and the reduced requirements for creating alts. I also agree that abuse should be curbed by a LL policy of removing proven abusers from the Instructor program, as you later mention in point #1.




I share this concern as well, that new residents will hoard vouchers and fear using them up, and thus lose out on education opportunities. Right now, students can attend classes freely, and it doesn't demand a minimum level of commitment on the student's part. Granted, a lack of commitment can result in disruptions to a class in some cases, but I think the advantages far outweigh the disadvantages. I think it's critical that attending educational events be mostly seamless for the student, and that all it takes is the student's desire to learn, or to try something out. Ultimately, I think the students would lose out if attending class required an evaluation like, "Is this class going to be worth my last voucher?"

To address class quality and teacher reputation, one idea that springs to mind is to have the first class taught by a particular teacher be free to the student. That way, if the teacher is poor, and the student doesn't get anything out of the teaching, the student won't return to that teacher. If the teacher is good, the student will probably return and pay a voucher for the second class. I offer this idea as a sort of brainstorming process, since I realize there are too many issues with it to work. What if students do like certain teachers, but can only afford to skip from free class to free class? What if a particular teacher specializes in one class, that you'd only need to attend once? Perhaps the first 10-15 minutes of instruction would be free, and students who feel like they're getting nothing out of the class could leave without paying a voucher.




Agreed. While many excellent teachers would benefit financially from the voucher system, it also introduces too many potential problems and possibilities for abuse, that would ultimately hurt the community of educators and learners in SL. (All of us!)



Carl already raised the issue of illegitimate ARs being filed as harassment, and to determine which ARs are legit or not would require more work from LL. Also, this would also disallow an otherwise good teacher who shoots back in "self-defense" without knowing better as a newbie. I realize it's still against the TOS to shoot back in self-defense, but many new residents may not realize this, or may feel there's no other option at the time.

I also wouldn't want to see finances linked to teaching ability. Financial and accounting mishaps often occur through no fault of the user, through bank errors, delays, account changes, etc. It would seem unduly harsh to ban ALL teachers with any money mishaps. This could also result in fewer international teachers, as international users may be more likely to have payment problems/errors than Americans, if for no other reason than the fact that it's harder to get a Linden on the phone to sort our your account problem if you're calling from somewhere more exotic. If bans were done on a case-by-case basis, this would require LL investigation into bank or internal errors, and would create even more work for LL staff.

I like your idea that an Instructor guilty of abuse/griefing/legitimate complaints should be suspended from ALL of the volunteer groups as well as Education Event Support for Instructors. Two months sounds like a fair first suspension period. Major or REPEATED infractions could result in permanent removal from volunteer groups.




This makes sense and would help with tracking, if the system is reprogrammed to take class ID numbers.

For the sake of automation, I would add that instructors teaching a common class need not submit their class title/descriptions if their class matches up with an existing class that already has an ID number.




I agree with Soj that we shouldn't be taxing educators for educating.




I agree with Carl that we should account for a third party being able to list the class for the Instructor.

As well, Instructors (or all residents) would either need more event listings a day, or the educational events should not count against the 5 event posts maximum a day. As well, we need to be able to Edit our events listings without using up another post. It would also help if the maximum was sorted by date, not by 24 hour period.



As others have mentioned, I also don't see the need for a 24 hour limit on this, nor the need to enter the names of students. I would like to see the reporting system in-world instead of by email or web, and an in-world reporter would encourage (but not require) an immediate claim. Automatic checks could also be built in to an in-world reporter, similar to Carl's proposal with his AAT. Manually entering the number of students who attended class might be a good idea, if the teacher is expected to enter the number honestly, and not just enter the number of avatars within range, for a period of time. However, I'm not sure there's any practical way to enforce honesty or integrity in this matter.

Checking that a student was present for 66% or so of the class is a good idea, but doesn't account for students who are logged in, within range, but not at class or are afk. Unfortunately, this would still leave room for abuse, without a live check-in on what is actually happening during the class.



I vehemently disagree with this, for various reasons. Firstly, as already stated by Carl, there is nothing wrong with teaching and not claiming pay if the teacher doesn't care about the money. Secondly, this would encourage abuse by those teachers who missed teaching their classes. While it may be irresponsible to miss teaching your own class, I wouldn't want LL to enact a policy requiring instructors to choose between claiming payment for a class not taught, and getting flagged for not claiming payment. The last thing we need is extra incentive for people to lie about having taught a class.



This seems overly harsh as well as impractical. For one, it'd be difficult to track back months/years to every class a teacher has ever taught. Secondly, the sum could be so large that very few would be expected to have that kind of money lying around. With the account in arrears, the avatar would likely be suspended from SL for being in debt, which would be extreme when all that is necessary is to prevent that person from teaching/cheating the system again. If nothing else, we'd lose a lot of residents this way.

There are a lot of good ideas in this proposal. I'd like to see a mix of yours and Carl's proposals, Carl's in-world AAT, mixed in with a lot of your ideas for accounting, automation, safeguards and deterrents against abuse. Most of the elements I think we need to improve on the system have been mentioned in various forum threads, so it's just a question of integrating them and making them work well.


Sel
(:

I've already replied multiple times that an AR being filed is not a mark on your rapsheet. Only action taken. I also stated that those would be considered and you only required a clean rapsheet for the last TWO months. This is plenty SHORT enough of a wait so that after some newb "firing back" has had plenty of time to realize DONT DO THAT AGAIN. =-) I'm also not discriminating against people with financial difficulties. I"m discriminating against people not mature and responsible enough to keep their entertainment budgets within their financial ability. We have BASIC accounts after all. If you cant afford a payment downgrade or dont upgrade. Period. Someone who doesnt have this level of maturity should not be spending time as a volunteer. They should be spending time straightening up their REAL LIFE situation that is far FAR more important in the grande scheme of things than 2nd Life. If for no other reason it will help encourage this level of responsible behaviour form people who would not think to do so on their own. For all I care financial rapsheet can be completely ignored. I just think it would be BEST for all parties involved with the biggest benifit being the volunteer encouraged to rethink their priorities. Back to ARs people are ALREADY filing ARs. Those have to get checked no matter what. This owuld not place any greater burden on the AR system, it would merely be USING the system already in place increasing its value and by double tasking it effectively increases its cost effectiveness for LLs investigations of the ARs already filed. And on both regards its not a 'ban'. Its forcing them to have a clean rapsheet for 2 months. Not harsh by any means. Violations of these only removes you from the volunteer groups for 2 months till your rapsheet is clean again. Not harsh by any means and helps give a MAJOR incentive for all volunteers to act professional.

Thats the only thing being done at all. If you have a dirty record you have to keep it clean for 2 months before applying.
Agreed and i removed the 50$L fee in my original post form the proposal the first day. I'm not suggesting any tax on an Instructor at all. I clearly stated that a LAND OWNER can flag their land as an Educational Area in the same manner as listing it for other uses. And if its already listed there would be no additional fee. Absolutely no cost is incured by the Instructor. Land Owners will benifit by having an 'EducationIcon' over their land on the world map. This could encourage new people to visit their land. Its a benifit to the land owner by increasing traffic thus only the land owner is "in a specific circumstance" paying a fee that most likely they are already paying with the regular listing and would not incur additional cost.
I dont disagree but that adds yet another feature to the list I've given. Its a GREAT suggestion with lots of benifits. But it isnt a requirement in improving education, reducing abuse and lowering the workload required by Linden Lab employees which are the 3 largest issues and the only ones im personally addressing to keep the feature as thorough as possible without added bloat. I highly support the idea. I just think that the main features should be done first so we have SOMETHING up and working sooner. Extra 'convienence' features could be added after the system is up and running.
Agree !!! My intention here is that these are NOT NORMAL EVENTS. They are their own category seperate in their own tab away from all other events (stated above). The are considered to be posted by the system and not by the instructor and are not countable against the avatars max events per day as they are NOT even posted by the same event page but by a special Instructor page for dealing with classes as stated above. This goes along with my agreeing with Soj that the instructor should not incur any financial burden directly (unless they are also the land owner, and then they are only paying for the benifit they gained).
Disagree com0pletely. Not requiring the Instructor to enter names encourages abuse of the system. Not everyone standing in the educational parcel are nessisarily attending class. We're NOT wanting to just bluntly count every avatar as that is not a truthful attendance.
Disagree. That would require the client code to take on the burden of the new Instructor method. Very ineffecient in comparison to web developement tools that already have access to the system. The web interface simplifies the burden on Linden Labs and does not place an additional one on the users. We're all on the internet already a web browser is plenty simple enough.
Agree, with the fact there is no way to enforce honestly using an in-world item. Since inworld objects are subject to UUID changes, communications spoofing and any number of security issues an in-world item should not be used at all. The tracking i proposed would make all the steps automated with no objects needed. No objects needed means no objects to abuse. Security.
Another reason names need manually entered. Its a quick cut/paste job and NO EFFORT at all on the part of the Instructors. I -already- do this at every class. Takes a couple seconds *shrugs*. With the names manually entered just being 'in-range' isn't gonna be enough to qualify someone as having been in attendance. I dont put limitations on AFK status because I've attended classes myself where i went AFK almost the whole class while doing house chores. Then came back to the computer and cut/pasted the chat history into wordpad and read up on the material. That instructor should still get credit for MY having attended becuase i did benifit from the instruction.
Umm i already agreed with that as does my suggest? The proposal IS NOT TO PUNISH anyone who does this. There *IS NOTHING WRONG* with not claiming pay. I've never said otherwise. What I said it does is when an Instructor chooses not to claim their class the system raises flags to make sure the class was taught. First by checking that the avatar was there (automated) and if the instructor was not there it raises a WARNING FLAG (not punishment) to increases that Instructors chances of recieving a random class audit. The audit is to ensure that the class is being taught by SOMEONE. If the instructor had real life concerns and made arrangements for someon else to teach THATS GREAT. If they cant find someone then they need to cancel the class. The only way for any type of punitive action to be taken is if you dont file for class, system determines you are not there, your RANDOM audit happens to come up (its not gaurenteed, just an increase in ODDs), during the random audit you are ALSO not there and no one else is covering for you.

For all this to happen you must be regularly abandoning classes a LOT. Thus you are giving new residents the impression a class is being held and decieving them. You are abusing the privledge of being paid for classes and abusing the privledge of having the special 'educational events' listing. I've clarified this mutliple times above already. It has nothing to do with Instructors who dont want paid. Im perfectly fine with that and nothing i've said would punish them for choosing to be benevolent. An instructor who ONLY wants to teach for free while having use of the Educational Events special listing to provide great class content IS ENCOURAGED to do so. Bless them for being so nice!!!

There are really a lot of points above that help to give an instructor the benifit of the doubt by having audits always remain random. There is no incentive to lie. An instructor can alwasy cancel their class posting. And if osmeone else covers that is responsible enough to take a names list that friend can still give you the list of names to submit.

Everything i've said eliminates many many methods someone could abuse the system, but i've left enough lieniency in many MANY regards that no one is ever gonna get punished or discriminated against becuase of accidents.
No. It requires ONE integer to be allocated for the account. As a payment is recieved this 'historic compensation' value gets increased by that ammount. Tracking numbers is a computers strength. Its dead easy and nothing could be simpler to design.
Dear god i hope so. Who is gonna voluntarily try to ABUSE a system knowing the consequences you can incur for doing so. Any common 'abuse' by an instructor only gets you kicked out of the volunteers. You've said you like this. The only thing that would have ANY chance of causing recompensation would be if you were found out to be CHEATING the instructor system by somehow finding a method to trick the system to validate a class that should not have been eligible to recieve payment. This would means you would have been randomly audited and a godmode liason in attendance would have noticed you NOT currently teach, no one else teaching, filed a note on this and then you somehow end up filing a report containing names of people who 'happen' to have been in the area for just long enough to count as legitimate students. Anyone who does that needs fraud charges filed against them in real court. Simply kicking out of all volunteer groups, lifetime baning them from ever reenterin and recouping all benifits recieved is a LIGHT punishment erring on the side of grace and forgiveness rather than justice.
And I would make sure to tell them dont let the door hit em in the rear as they leave. Good ridance to losing those kind of people.
Well, sadly i'll admit that i wrote the whole thing while a bit emotional after only reading the in-world transcripts of the voucher stuff. I didnt take the time to read any other posts on the topic and kinda just rambled. But i _DO_ think i put a lot of effort into making sure that all the various aspects i've said integrate well and compliment each other.

Now to _everyone_:

Except for conceeding to Soj about instructors should not be required to pay a 50$L fee to use the special Education Events idea i still havent found an argument to make me change my stance on any other topic. In a lot of cases people misunderstood what i thought was a well stated suggestion and I've reclarified a LOT of the individual aspects and described them in a bit more detail than originally.

If AFTER READING THE CLARIFICATIONS someone still disagrees I would really appreciate if you could take the time to pick a single greivance and fully write out (in depth) why that one feature still irks you. Please if you can supply an example of a potential REAL LIFE situation where a given feature in my list would have an unjust consequence. I would 'ask' that you please keep one issue per post so that we can continue this thread with more intelligent debate and focus on issues individually. Multiple posts are great if you have multiple greivances but since useful debates tend to take a bit of writing covering more than one issue per reply can get tedious.

I'm truely grateful that though people posting have had really strong ideas everyone has maintained themselves in a very mature manner. Id like to see that continue. Thank you EVERYONE who has replied.

Any of those counterposts coming with comments on the clarifications? Any LINDEN comments or opinions? (Lindens stating an opinion as their own and not neccisarily that of LL as a whole are quite welcome)

Yes I'm bumping. I just feel all sides still have opinions left floating out for debate.

I decided to re-read this post to see if any of my ideas could be combined with yours. :3
Now that a few different ideas have been established, it's time to start combining each idea's best aspects.

Numbers 2 and 3 could be combined with my Chat Rooms idea. In fact, I think the Chat Room would eliminate the need for #3. One possiblity: In order to set the Chat Room as a Classroom, you have to enter the Class ID and have it check LL's database to verify that it's not only a valid ID, but that it's been properly scheduled. (refer to no. 4 in the original post).

The *only* problem I currently foresee with the Chat Room idea is how to implement it in a way such that it won't obstruct view too much. Many classes are hands-on in addition to the verbal instruction, so minimal interference would be necessary. I'm not so sure that this is really a huge problem, as I expect the window would be scalable...

Anyone, let me know your thoughts on this... and if you'd like, i'll try to draw up my ideas for the interface design.

PS- here's a link to the post where I present the Chat Rooms feature idea:
[post]115892[/post]

I wouldnt object to having a special Conferance IM feature for classes. But the educational parcel i still see as integral as its part of how events are handled. They are always 'somewhere'. That way visual props are easy to set up and maintain. People like pictures.

I like it as an additional feature but by the various details running on the rumor mill about future communication tools i think this may exist to any extent you would like without it having to be Instructor specific. Worth thinking about.

... the chat rooms in my idea would not be instructor specific, but would have certain tools that are instructor specific. and the reporting that could be automated using the chat room could include the location of the chat, as well as a list of chat room attendees or whatever.

i'm mostly out of the loop when it comes to rumour. got a link that'll get me in the know?

Most of your suggestions have a good deal to reccomend them. However, I cannot agree with some of your conclusions.


An in world reporting device makes this unecessary, it could report immediately
Entering names only encourages mistakes from all people, not abuse. That leads to more work for LL, whereas a scripted object couldn't make those mistakes, or be made to lie.

I would hope any device is not scanning the entire parcel, as your suggestion would. It should be worn by the Instructor (prefereably a HUD) and only scan in their proximity. If on the Instructors land it should ignore anyone not so, even if within the required distance. It could also ensure that any counted person is there for the required time.
If the distance is low, say 5 metres or less, it also ensures that there is likely to be some level of interaction with the Instructor, hence likely to be in the class. This would require that the instructor get close enough to register a student, not a problem from my experience watching Instructors.

There's nothing in your system to stop a dishonest person counting every avatar and noting their name. Frankly a dishonest person is more inclined to make such an effort than an honest one.



Not the client code, a scripted device. Your suggestion would require the sim code to take on the burden instead, in order to record 'Education' land. Making the server code more complicated for this is unecessary, a scripted device could do the job just a easily, require less resources, and be far simpler to alter/update than the sim code is.
We're also all in SL, a scripted object is just as simple, guaranteed to be compatible with your client, and saves us the hassle of manually collating and reporting the information.
The web interface is an excellent idea for being able to set up/administer classes though.



I beg to differ, there is no way to enforce honesty with any Instructor based reporting. A scripted object can only do as instructed. It can't lie about who is present unlike the Instructor, unless it was scripted to do so and I'm sure LL wouldn't include that feature. Neither method can stop a dishonest Instructor from inviting friends over to party and claiming it as a class.

UUID changes are irrelevant, as the object would send the Instructor's UUID to specify who's taking the class.
Communictaion spoofing could theortically be a consideration, but they'd also have to know all the data needed for a legitimate report (like the Instructors key, class ID etc). very unlikely as a scripted object would ensure that the data is all kept within LL systems (i.e. if the object emails LL with data, said data will never leave the LL email server so not be opened to snooping).
I'd like to know the other security issues, as they should be of concern to all users of scripted objects in use currently.



Having land set as 'Educational':
1) Restricts Instructors that also use their land for other purposes
2) Would require LL to make more checks (i.e. increase work load not reduce it.) or anyone could do it.
3) Requires changes to server code, which is undesirable.
4) Increases the work that a sim must perform (continuously by your suggestion) (admittedly a device would add to the work also, but the sim is supposed to run scripted devices and it would only be for the class duration, not 24/7)
5) Why require classes on specific land? The Instructor has already been registered, why add complications by registering the Land as well?


A well scripted device could:
1) Lift the burden from Instructors from manually collating data and submitting a report. (Instructors want to instruct, not do unecessary paperwork!)
2) Remove the possibility of erroneously entered data (SL names are frequently misread/misspelled)
3) Ensure data is entered in the format required by automated systems. (Users will ALWAYS find a way to screw this up without even trying. This will then require manual intervention or ignoring. The former creates more work when we're trying to reduce it. The latter penalises Instructors for not being compuers themselves)
4) Require less resources (server and Instructor) to collect the needed data. (As it's only in use during a class and it only collects UUIDs from those close enough to be considered part of the class, not the whole parcel or sim).

Any device/script should of course be no mod, no transfer and only given to accredited Instructors.

In my experience, ANY system can be abused. But it is usually far easier for a user to abuse the system when they supply the information.