Hello all, I'm new to this list and wanted to share information on a project that might be of interest to some researchers. Information Renaissance, a non-profit non-partisan organization, produces an online public policy dialogues. From June 3-14 we will be conducting a dialogue on the draft Master Plan for California's Kindergarten-University education. The plan is being developed by an 18 member Joint Legislative Committee and is based on the recommendations of seven working groups that have involved over 300 people during the last year. This is the first time a Master Plan for the state's education has been created. The two-week moderated dialogue will focus on selected recommendations in the draft plan. Each day a panel of policy and subject experts will join the discussion. Members of the Joint Committee, Working Groups and representatives of the Governors' office, the Department of Education and the Board of Education are being invited to join the dialogue. Participants are being recruited through many channels-online and traditional media. We are announcing the discussion through the state League of Women Voters, PTA, major education organizations, and many other groups. Staff for the Joint Committee is handling relations with the press. We anticipate there will be a great deal of interest in the dialogue. A registration form will gather demographics on participants. Discussion summaries will provide an overview of the main points covered each day. Daily survey forms based on the summaries will capture the views of the larger group, both discussants and observers. Info Ren has conducted six similar dialogues, on the E-Rate, Social Security Reform, Money and Politics, and two for the U.S. EPA. The last discussion for the US EPA was on the agency's revision of its Public Involvement Policy. EPA recently won an E-Gov 2002 Explorer Award in recognition of that effort. The dialogue on the CA Education Master Plan will be a great opportunity to learn more about online communication from the perspectives of leadership and collaboration, public policy, public participation, group dynamics, etc. The Web site will be open after May 1st: http://www.network-democracy.org/camp Please contact me if you are interested in more information about the dialogue for research purposes. Laurie Maak Dialogue Producer Information Renaissance 510-527-6474