It is important for me to make a few things clear about the course, in order for you to decide whether you want to remain or not. If you are thinking of leaving, please do so quickly as the beginning of the term is when we need to sort ourselves into small teams for the role playing exercises. Knowing who is and is not in the course becomes very important, for us to organize. Some key points about the course include: there are no exams; twenty percent of your course grade is based on class participation (and this year that becomes participation on our newsgroup BUT that is run in a very specific way, that you need to understand and FOLLOW -- basically we will be having Mon Wed and Fri "classes" (encouraging you to be online at certain times but allowing you to still contribute asynchronously but on THOSE days of the week, Eastern time zone -- more in a moment)); you have to write 4 essays individually, 1 in a group, and to fill in 1 answer-the-question sheet and these assignments make up 60 percent of your grade (but you get feedback in order to progressively improve with your writing); you are also put into teams for role playing exercises which require 1 position paper, 1 very brief joint-agreement document and demonstrated talent in answering questions from your classmates, for the final 20 percent of your grade.