Students used digital voice recorders, phone controllers and even Skype to record interviews with staffers.

When Michael Shenkman, an attorney with experience in all three branches of government, accepted Yale’s invitation to teach Political Science 269, “Executive Staff in American Government,” he wanted his students to reach outside the classroom to study their subject. “For their final assignment,” he notes, “I asked students to conduct interviews with senior government office holders and staff members.” His reasons were straightforward: “I not only wanted the class to engage methodologically with a different way of learning, I also felt that in order to get a closer understanding of staffing issues, students needed to interact directly with those who had held key positions in government.”

Unlike the standard term paper, personal interviews supported the class’ pedagogical goals in ways that traditional assignments could not.  “There is substantial published information on how staffing works in the White House,” Shenkman points out, “but far less on the congressional and judicial branches.”  Interviewing offered students a unique opportunity to fill this gap by transforming classroom goals into scholarly ones: the creation of new knowledge in a relatively barren area of political science.  Or, as Shenkman put it in the four-page instruction manual he supplied to students, interviewing presents “a rare opportunity to do primary research work in an undergraduate course.”

Introducing an unconventional assignment, of course, is not without its risks.  While Yale students are all-too-familiar with taking tests and preparing term papers, conducting interviews and transforming them into full presentations remain terra incognita for many. Recognizing this, Shenkman worked closely with students, guiding them through the five-step process of having students identify and secure appointments, prepare for the interview, conduct it, transcribe it, and finally present the results of it to the entire class.  Readying his students was critical since a quarter of their grade depended on this new type of assignment.  As his manual bluntly put it, “I will grade this assignment on interview skills as reflected in your transcript; the quality of your analysis with respect to course themes as reflected in both the transcript and your presentation; and the quality of the presentation, including responses to questions.”

Used with specialized software, the transcription pedal keeps your hands free to type while you use your feet to slow down or rewind digital recordings.

Shenkman recognized that an assignment this intense naturally required supplying students with the right equipment.  For that, he turned to the Instructional Technology Group’s Matthew Regan, an Instructional Designer, and Computer and Instructional Services Support Specialist, Thomas Hallihan.  “When we received the request to assist the students with their interviewing assignment,” Regan explains, “we saw this as an opportunity to build a collection of hardware and software that could support any instructor who wanted to incorporate interviewing into the classroom experience.”

“After researching what was available, we decided to update our technological resources to make the process of recording and transcribing as easy as possible for the students,” notes Ken Panko, manager of the ITS Instructional Technology Group.  Because students were required to submit transcripts of the interviews, quality recordings in a friendly digital format were vital to the assignment’s success.

According to Regan, that meant replacing older voice recorders with new ones that created MP3- formatted recordings, which allowed students to work with the sound files on either a Mac or PC. To ensure sound quality and ease transcription, the team also supplied three important bits of equipment. Students borrowed “phone controllers,” which linked the caller’s landline or mobile phone directly to the voice recorder so as to produce clear, crisp recordings. When playing back their interviews, students used a digital foot pedal to speed up or slow down the recording which reduced the amount of time spent transcribing. Finally, for students who wanted all of these components in one place, a computer station was set up in the Political Science Department with a Skype account, recording software, and a transcription pedal.

The phone controllers were used to record audio from landline or mobile phone interviews directly to the digital recorders. Students obtained prior permission from interviewees to record the calls.

“The support from the Instructional Technologies Group and the Political Science department significantly reduced what would have otherwise been formidable obstacles,” Shenkman recounts.  In fact, by removing geographical challenges and the threat of poor sound recording, the students dramatically expanded the range of potential interview subjects. The class successfully landed interviews with a White House speech writer, a Senate chief of staff, a federal circuit judge, a key member of the National Economic Council, even a former attorney general of the United States.  “Students bravely reached out to some very powerful people,” Shenkman adds, “and were pleased to discover how much their subjects welcomed the chance to talk about their work.”  As for the technology, Shenkman adds, “I knew I was in good hands.  The equipment and support of the technology team let students leave the classroom, giving them the sometimes rare opportunity to conduct actual field work in this area of political science.”

The digital voice recorders and other equipment are available for use in other Yale College and Graduate School of Arts and Sciences courses by emailing the Instructional Technology Group at itg@yale.edu.