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Yassir Arafat takes one long last swallow of his Coke, grabs his backpack and runs across campus. He is late for a meeting with Shimon Perez in the cafeteria. Perhaps the real Yassir Arafat does not own a backpack, and Shimon Perez is not likely to meet with him in a university cafeteria. On the campus of Macquarie University in Sydney, New South Wales, Australia, however, and on the campuses of Internet partners around the world, students are bringing politics to life through online interactive role-playing of complicated and controversial events taking place in the real world. Professors Andrew Vincent and John Shephard offer political science students an online multimedia simulation of current events in the Middle East instead of a normal written final exam..
WHO IS INVOLVED
For each simulation, second- or third-year Macquarie University students work with students in a similar course at another university. So far, simulations have taken place with Georgetown University in Washington, DC; University of Texas at Austin; Canterbury University in Christchurch, New Zealand; American University in Cairo, Egypt; and University of Melbourne in Australia. Vincent stated, "This has proven to be much more effective than in-house simulations as it adds an unknown and exotic dimension for the students. They are not just playing against their classmates, but against students in another country and with a substantially different world view.
"At the same time it goes some way towards countering Australian geographical isolation by bringing students more in touch with the wider world. The technique also introduces liberal arts students to more esoteric aspects of computing than they would normally be expected to know."
HOW IT WORKS
Vincent and his student controllers set up the simulations by determining a broad scenario and developing a list of the likely major players. The job of the controllers is to monitor thousands of e-mail messages sent back and forth among students and to rule on any attempts by players to take significant actions other than diplomacy (for example, to make a military strike).
These major players become the simulation roles. The overall number of roles depends on the number of students involved from the various universities, but there are usually between 30 and 60 roles. This number could easily be adjusted to accommodate student participation, subject matter and other factors.
Asked how he decides distribution of roles between participating universities, Vincent explained, "This has varied. On some occasions, for example, we have insisted American students play American roles; on other occasions we have given American roles to non-American students. Both approaches seem to produce effective results, and either approach may lead to some interesting self-appraisal by the students. For example, American students being shocked at how non-Americans play American roles."
Once teams are formed, they must develop a fairly extensive profile of the role to be played. This is a very important task and requires quite a bit of research on the part of the students. "Yes, it was a lot of work," said one student, "but it was fun. And although working as a team was sometimes frustrating, it helped that everyone was assigned different areas to research. One person just could not have done it all."
Vincent finds that students are very creative in exploring their character's motivation, using the Internet, libraries, books and journal articles, calling consulates and embassies or even getting in touch personally with the subject. "I really felt the sense of frustration of trying to maintain my character's goals while keeping aligned with our country," said a student. Another student commented, "The Internet allowed me to keep up-to-date with my character and let me know just how he would act or behave. I also tried to analyze just how he would think/react to future events that hadn't occurred before." The simulation itself takes about three weeks of intensive diplomacy on the part of the participating students. They use both e-mail and a chatroom to talk to other diplomats and work towards finding mutually agreed-upon solutions.
Raphael Veit first participated in the simulation as a student in 1994. He has served as a controller and helped set up simulations since then. He is currently coordinator of the Middle East Center and is completing a Ph.D. in Middle East politics. "It was really interesting to work with students at other universities. You find out that they study differently or view a situation in a very different way," he said. "It got me to go to class, and it held my attention enough to keep me working on the simulation when I would probably have been hanging out with my friends."
At the end of a simulation, all students participate in a live three-hour teleconference. The teleconference is the first time in the simulation that various characters meet to discuss issues that have developed through their negotiations. All members of each participating group meet  (at each site) and listen to each other's presentations, many dressed in character for the teleconference. One student said, "It was good to actually speak to the people we had been e-mailing and then persuade them and advance our own interest. We stayed pretty much in character, but sometimes real personality clashes came out."
Vincent added, "At one stage, a teleconference was held among universities in Washington, Cairo and Sydney. The only time all countries could agree upon turned out to be 3 a.m. in Sydney. Despite this, around 20 students turned up at Macquarie to join in. This is testament to the enthusiasm the simulations engender in the students."
EVALUATION
After each simulation, students fill out an extensive questionnaire. Vincent also conducts an in-depth session with the controllers at the end of each simulation. Vincent and the controllers actively seek suggestions from students on improving the simulations.
Vincent explained why he believes simulations are the best way to teach, "Students get far more than detailed knowledge of the Middle East. They learn things not found in books."
Said Veit, "There are lots of things that go on behind the scenes that most of us never consider. Now, when I read the newspaper, I think about what had to happen to get to this point and what is still going on that isn't clear on the surface."
One of Vincent's students said, "It especially brought to light how hard it would be to make certain decisions in real life. It is so hard to please everybody." Another student commented, "You really learn to sympathize with the people's causes and issues, how they feel or react, also how politics works and how strongly issues (i.e., terrorism) are dealt with internationally." Finally, as one student discovered, "It enhanced my understanding of all politics, how fast-moving it is and how situations change at a rapid pace."
 GET TO KNOW
Dr. Andrew Vincent
& Dr. John Shepherd
Q. How do you manage
the simulations?
Vincent: "I supervise all aspects of the project, except for managing the technological side. Ideally, some administrative support would be available to assist in setting up the simulation, especially as participating international universities change from semester to semester. Tasks include finding a three-week period suitable for both Macquarie and the participating university, setting up the scenario and ensuring all participants are included in a group to which a role has been assigned."
Q. How do you grade the students?
Vincent: "Students are graded as a team, which hopefully develops the peer pressure to get everyone on the team involved. We have a formula for grading that gives points for the role profile that is written by the team, the quantity of messages sent, the quality of messages and performance during the teleconference."
Q. How much does a simulation cost?
Vincent: "We pay controllers $200 each for the simulation, which is really only a token payment for a lot of work they do voluntarily. The teleconference cost has been donated in the past by the American Consulate in Sydney. Then there are the international telephone calls. Sometimes I've paid for them out of my own pocket. I would say that total expenses for a simulation are less than $1,000 Australian."
Q. Dr. Shepherd, you designed the technical support for the simulation and supervised the programmers who worked on the necessary software. How would you describe the system?
Shepherd: "Students use a Web-based interface that provides the basic communication facilities they need to conduct diplomacy. There's an e-mail service for one-to-one (or one-to-a-group) private correspondence. There's a chatroom for interactive discussions. There's also a news service where they can see what other players are doing, as reported by the media roles in the simulation. The system also lets participants check whether other teams are currently logged on and what the time is at the various universities that are involved in the simulation."
Q. What made you decide to
use the Internet for simulations?
Shepherd: "Internet-based simulations have quite different characteristics to conventional classroom-based simulations and in fact overcome some of their disadvantages. For example, Internet-based communication may be helpful in slowing down communication. Classroom-based simulations require students to think and react in realtime. For some kinds of simulation, this is quite appropriate, but for simulations of international relations systems, time is required for reflection and consideration of negotiating positions. The mode of interaction provided by e-mail fits naturally with this kind of communication. Simulation over a period of days or weeks, rather than hours in a classroom, allows strategies to be fully considered and communications phrased more appropriately."
Q. What have you learned as a teacher?
Vincent: "I've had to learn to relinquish some control over the learning environment. I have to allow the process to move in unexpected directions and step back and just let things run. At the same time, I have to be ready to handle unexpected situations that may arise during the course of a simulation."
Q. What do you hope your students
will gain from the simulation experience?
Vincent: "I see learning as more than extracting information from books. It's a process of self-discovery and learning about yourself and how an individual interacts with the world around them. Simulations have a number of advantages as a learning method where the aim is to gain an appreciation of processes or complex dynamic social systems. Things students discover themselves, they never forget. In a very practical sense, I believe participating in the simulations has given our students an advantage in the job market. For example, a number of our undergraduate students have been placed in the Australian Foreign Affairs Department. The Internet is also beneficial in overcoming potential shyness of students in performing in front of their peers in a classroom-based simulation. With the relative anonymity of e-mail and an ability to deliberately compose a response, such students will be able to make a valuable contribution to a computer-based simulation."
Q. Could such simulations work
for other fields of study?
Vincent: "I believe skills students learn while participating in the simulations (thinking on one's feet, formulating convincing arguments, dealing diplomatically with individuals from different backgrounds and with opposing views) are applicable to just about every profession. In fact, prior to our most recent simulation we were approached by a lecturer in an engineering course at the University of Technology Sydney who was concerned about his students. Although his courses are producing graduates who are technically excellent, they have not had an opportunity to practice their skills in a more political environment and are not always savvy in dealing with other people.
"The example he gave me was graduates in the workplace do not understand why their designs, while clearly the best, are sometimes rejected for political reasons. So we had a small group of engineering students from UTS in our most recent simulation, playing the role of water advisors to Syria, Iraq, Turkey and the United Nations. We hope to continue to increase involvement of other faculties and universities in the future."
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By Robyn Maher