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Deliberative Polling

Topic:

Deliberative Polling® employs social science to determine what people would think about an issue if they became more engaged and informed. A random, representative sample is first polled on some specific public interest topic. After this baseline poll, members of the sample are invited to gather at a single place for one or more days in order to discuss the issue. Carefully balanced briefing materials developed by an all-partisan advisory group are sent to the participants and are also made publicly available. The participants engage in dialogue with competing experts and decision makers based on questions they develop in small group discussions with trained moderators. After the deliberations, the sample of citizens is again asked the original questions. The resulting changes in opinion represent the conclusions the public would reach if people had an opportunity to truly deliberate about an issue, engage with alternative points of view, and become more informed. For more information about Deliberative Polls®, please visit the Center for Deliberative Democracy.

Goals:

The first goal of this initiative is for AASCU institutions to test Deliberative Polling strategies on campus to engage students, faculty, staff, and/or members of the broader community in discussions of public issues. The second goal of the initiative is to develop strategies and practices built from Deliberative Polling that can be used to educate undergraduates about issues, and to develop citizenship skills of engagement that can used when students graduate and become members of communities.

Achievements:

In 2008 and 2009, selected AASCU institutions hosted Deliberative Polls® on their campuses. In 2010, the third Deliberative Polling Institute will be held at the ADP National Meeting. This institute will feature two models of Deliberative Polls®. The first model will maintain the integrity of the social science behind conducting a statistically significant Deliberative Poll®. The second model will be a hybrid of the tools implemented in a Deliberative Poll® (such as discussion group facilitators, issue-based dialogue, and panels of leading experts.) but will not adhere to the strict and oftentimes costly social science requirements of having a representative sample.