Effects of Assigned Collaboration on Student Performance: Results from an Experiment
This paper studies how to best structure collaborate work in out-of-classroom activities in a math-based course such as Data Analysis and Politics. Preliminary results from the first randomized experiment suggest that assigning students partners with slightly different math backgrounds, as compared to allowing students to choose their own partners, has positive effects on (a) level of collaboration, (b) engagement in the class, and (c) performance.