The Fall 2016 - Spring 2017 Historia Scholastica Judges group, a team dedicated to the translation of a Medieval Latin document, explored electronic venues to make the project bridge communities across physical space through an online collaboration tool. We evaluated commonly-available platforms to select a tool with sufficient potential to facilitate future online collaborative efforts with community partners. Throughout the Spring 2017 semester, we collaborated via the platform to judge its performance.
We agreed on the continued use of Google related applications, including Google Docs and Hangout. In the process, we encountered multiple issues: exigent circumstances, including snow days, classmates overseas, and former classmates likely not using their university E-mails caused many delays in the class schedule and difficulty in communication. Communication between Historia Scholastica Project (HSP) team members was frequently unclear and hangouts were difficult to conduct, with not everyone online simultaneously.
The implementation of Google as a collaborative tool within HSP is on-going, initiated on a two-month trial. Results will be evaluated on criteria of communication and scheduling, with a bearing on future HSP collaborations
