By Grace Gallagher ’26
This spring, the DCI hosted our semester D Teams on a series of education-based topics. Our first meeting focused on Public Schools and School Vouchers, our second meeting on Grades and Standardized Tests, and our third meeting on College Admissions (Affirmative Action, Athlete Admissions, and Legacy Admissions).
As a facilitator, I thoroughly enjoyed my group’s meetings this semester. Each of the three discussions were related and connected to the other meetings, but not so much that they were repetitive. The cohesive topics make the D Team members more confident in their opinions because they developed them throughout three related meetings, leading them to trust each other and open up or be vulnerable. The group members had experience talking to each other and could build on the relationships they had already established.
Additionally, when focusing on education, everyone in my group had the opportunity to share both informative comments and comments reflecting on their personal experiences. My group was comprised of half students and half alums or parents, all of whom provided interesting viewpoints and perspectives. The students could share recent reflections from their grade school, high school, and college experiences, whereas the parents and alums could relate them to their experiences from the past. Additionally, parents and alums could share reflections and points of view from either a parent or career perspective.
Before this spring semester, I had only ever been a part of D Teams in person, both as a facilitator last fall and a deliberator in the Fall of 2022. I went into this experience wishing that my D Team was in-person because of the relationships you can build when actually being in the room with the other deliberators. I was amazed to see what Zoom deliberations can provide in a different way. Having my deliberation on Zoom allowed for people all over to join, providing different perspectives, stories, and experiences. Additionally, being on Zoom allowed my group to have people working in education from different areas who could learn from both their shared experiences and their differences in education, depending on the region. This was valuable to watch as a facilitator as it fostered discussions in directions I had yet to see while facilitating in person.
