Issue link: http://www.e-digitaleditions.com/i/56805
Can you clarify what is meant by Question 7 in this week's evaluation? What is the amount that must be raised in series C so that Catch does not run out of funds? leaned over to the guys next to me and asked, "What's this mean?" They had no clue! But they looked more confident. That's when I realized, "Oh, my questions are actually good!" TOOLS OF THE TRADE One Professor's Test Drive of Piazza Peter DeMarzo, a senior asso- ciate dean at the Stanford Graduate School of Busi- ness, was the first to use the beta version of Piazza, Pooja Sankar's brainchild, in 2009. He introduced it to the nearly 100 students in his corporate financial modeling course, part of Stanford's core MBA curriculum. "Before, when students had questions, they would e-mail our teaching assistants. But after answer- ing a question once, our TAs might get the same ques- tion from another student six hours later," says DeMarzo. "This new platform seemed to be an ideal way to coordinate the Q&A process." There are other resources that allow students and fac- ulty to post questions and announcements, but DeMarzo says that they mostly serve as boards and forums. Piazza, on the other hand, offers a social networking user interface that students find more engaging, so that they log on and stay on for hours. "Once students discover how useful it is, they're always there. If you go to our lab, students will have their projects open on one screen and Piazza open on another," says DeMarzo. Because students answer each other's questions so quickly, DeMarzo doesn't need to be a constant pres- ence on the platform, he says. However, he still can check in to catch up on stu- dents' online conversations. If he finds that students' advice misses the mark, he can step in to clarify. According to Sankar, the ability to ask and answer questions anonymously is one of Piazza's most popular features. Even so, DeMarzo convinced her to give faculty the option to turn that feature off. "I find that students are more thought- ful in their questions and answers when their names are there," he says. "Plus, I teach MBA students. They're not intimidated." DeMarzo also sees more potential for the faculty's use of the platform. "I've suggest- ed to Pooja that she open this up to faculty who are teaching the same course at different institutions. This could be a mecca for them to interact with each other." For more information about Piazza, visit www. piazza.com. In theory, business schools support collaboration, but in practice, some people are just too shy to raise their hands or ask questions. If there's a place for stu- dents to gather online, they can ask for help, answer BizEd March/April 2012 55