Decision Making with a large group of people

In class, on 11/14, which was the day our professor gave us our midterm back, you could tell the classroom was unhappy with the results they received on the test. After receiving some feedback from the class, our professor presented us with a challenge. He told us to figure out as a group how we would like him to change the grades to the test. He said he would not consider anything outrageous, but he is open to a curve, extra credit etc., but every single student in the class must come to a general consensus.

When the decision making process began, I was open to compromise. I felt that all the people in the class were equal, and we needed to come to a decision together. I did not realize how hard this was actually going to be. I chose this method because I felt the only way everyone in the class would be happy with the decision if everyone had an equal say in it.

If I could look back on the task at hand now, I would rather have everyone take on the collaborating approach. This approach was suggested by some class members in the beginning of the session, but then disregarded. If everyone broke into smaller groups, and came up with group proposals, and each group presented each proposal to the class, we would have had a better chance at taking full advantage of this opportunity to shape our grades. We could have taken the most popular proposals, and combined the most attractive attributes of each to come up with optimal idea.

Regardless, we did eventually reach a consensus, in the last minute of class, and make out pretty well. Next time, we will make out even better!