The importance of the second loop in educational technology: An action science study of introducing blogging in a course curriculum

Using action science for understanding the web’s role in education

An action science approach was used to explore, expand, and better understand the task of integrating blog use into a classroom context in ways that extend and improve teaching learning processes. There are a number of reasons why action science can be helpful in attempting to develop new educational processes through application of the readable/writable web. The outline of actions science developed by Argyris and Schon (1974) is a descendant of Lewin’s early ideas on action research (1946) and by extension his larger field theory (1943). The original conception of action research focuses on reorganization of community problem solving through direct and indirect intervention based primarily in the quality of human relationships. The primary purpose of the intervention is redefining the field of social relationships so they are more democratic, less hierarchical, and less linear (Glassman, Erdem and Bartholomew, in press). Argyris and Schon’s amplification of Lewin’s work looks to establish change through ongoing learning processes rather than simply directed intervention, or training as it was later termed (Kleiner, 1996). The web can be understood in many ways, but in this paper it is conceptualized primarily as a tool/intervention capable of changing the trajectory of curriculum, teaching approaches, and student activities in what are mostly still undetermined and possibly uncomfortable ways. The integration of new web technologies into teaching/learning is and will be very much about ongoing changes in the organizational structure of traditional education environments (e.g. the classroom) – changes that we believe will dramatically impact student-student as well as student-teacher relationships (Glassman & Kang, 2011).

There is a second, related reason why action science might be an important approach for understanding the web. The web and its applications offer the possibility of moving the classroom in the direction of Dewey inspired (1916) learning processes, including problem centered logic (Glassman & Kang, 2011). Schon especially was influenced by Dewey and helped integrate a Deweyan perspective into action science – where success is determined not by quantity and/or quality of sanctioned information or predetermined results, but through solving the underlying, critical problems of the community. Attempting to find new solutions through an adjustment to action (what Argyris and Schon refer to a single loop learning) often results in failure, not because you chose the wrong solution but because you were working from the wrong problem (Dewey, 1938). Failures in interventions/problem solving very often signal the need to return to the beginning of the process so as to re-examine and, perhaps, redefine the problem in a new way. Argyris and Schon (1974) concretized this process as challenging the underlying norms and objectives of an organization in order to change them. The best (and maybe the only) way to do this is through a series of Pragmatic experiments that highlight inconsistencies between two types of action: the actions (especially privileged) members of an organization say they want (espoused theories) and the actions that actually occur (theories in use).

The action science approach and the importance of second loop learning

The action science approach used in this paper is a modification of the work of Argyris and Schon (1974) on the evolution of organizations through what they refer to as single loop and double loop learning. Argyris puts emphasis on the process of change (1992) and suggests a series of exploratory experiments, allowing members of the target organization to recognize the underlying motivations and meanings, the “governing variables” of their communications and interactions. This process of change is based in the idea that there are two types of learning, one reactive and one foundational. Argyris and Schon compare reactive, single loop learning to a “thermostat that learns when it is too hot or too cold and turns the heat on or off.” (1978, p.2) Double loop learning is more foundational, related to the system of interconnected relationships guiding behaviors within the organization, or in Lewin’s word the “field” of human activity. These governing variables ultimately determine an organizations “underlying norms, policies, and objectives” (ibid, p. 3), and through them the theories-in-use.

Foundational relationships have specific value to members of an organization, especially for those in positions of power, so the default response to problems is often reactive in nature. However there is little long term, “logical” benefit to single loop learning. The best way to foster change through learning is to develop concrete examples that highlight the limitations of simple, adjustment based strategies. Decisions makers confront the differences between their assumptions of consequences or espoused theories (based on inferences about how things should work) and concrete experiences of theories-in-use (based on governing variables). Educational institutions, especially classrooms, can be especially susceptible to differences between assumptions and inferences and the concrete impact of goal oriented activities but underlying educational norms are rarely challenged on any level. Even when individuals attempt to change or “reform” education in some way, their espoused theories of what they want to happen are often at odds with theories-in-use. Proactive change is dependent on exploration of this phenomenon in the context of double loop learning approaches.

Participants

The participants in this study were two consecutive large general education courses in Child Development, one with 132 students and one with 130 students that were populated primarily by students who wanted to apply to the Masters of Education program. The classes took place over two consecutive quarters and had the same subject matter/curricula. There was nothing in the class descriptions describing the new technologies that would be used. The teaching team – instructor and Teaching Assistants (TAs) – remained constant over the two quarters.

Planning the interventions/adjustments

The instructor and the two Teaching Assistants (i.e. teaching team) had all been part of a graduate level course that attempted to integrate blogs and wikis as major components of the course (Glassman, Bartholomew & Jones 2011). Student use of blogging in the course had only been partially successful and the use of wikis not at all. Based on the combined data, the teaching team decided on a series of unique intervention strategies to integrate blogging as a central task of the target undergraduate course.

Initial strategies included,

Blog posting should be continuous throughout the course. Blogging can be very much dependent on momentum and continuous participation. It was believed that, even if the syllabus required a specific amount of blog posts and commenting, many of the students would wait until the end of the semester to fulfill their posting requirement.

Two major issues

One of the reasons, or espoused theories, for making blogging a major component of the course was to create a non-hierarchical, less linear teaching/learning environment. Many blogs, when they are used in traditional classrooms, create some type of separation between teacher and student (e.g., so students can read what the instructor is thinking about a specific subject; or for instructors to read and comment on what students are thinking about Lin et. al 1996).

A second major issue was student motivation to do a good job on the course blog. In the pre-web world, motivation to work hard in education is primarily accomplished through course grades including extra credit. In an attempt to increase motivation for writing good blog posts and finding relevant, provocative links, a reward system was instituted. Students with the best blog posts, links, and comments would get an automatic A on the test.

Using interventions to promote change

Most of the students were not familiar with blogs, which was surprising to us. Therefore, we devoted some time in the first class to visiting blogs of varying topics on a computer-connected screen at the front of the room so they could get an idea of what blogs looked like and different styles of posting. Students seemed confused and angry during this first introduction and about ten percent dropped the course. The students were asked to bring their laptop computers to class and keep them open so that they could search for links about interesting things heard during lecture and subsequently post them to the course blog which would be visible on a screen at the front of the class.

The following lecture, most of the students (about 90%) brought their laptops to class and had them open on their desks. The students were informed that the blog itself was open access, which meant their writing for the course could be accessed from anywhere on the web. Most students chose to use pseudonyms for their blog posts (which they shared with the teaching team). It is difficult to know if the students understood the concept of open access even though the teaching team went into some depth on the subject. Most of the students’ web experience was with social networking sites which are not open access - you have to “friend” someone before they can have access to your information. The ability to post to the blog was based on being invited to the blog by the administrator.

As the course continued, many of the students seemed to become more familiar with the blogging process, but a number of students remained reticent, and a few continued to be angry about the blogging component. Students exhibited anger after lectures to the instructor, in out-of-class communications with TAs, and a few times in posts on the community blog. The major complaint of the students was that they were taking the course to learn the subject matter and not how to use new technology. The following quote from an original blog post reflects student complaints,

“The way this class is being run is somewhat absurd. It's ridiculous that I am even allowed to blog about something not related to the actual class content. I took Child Development because I was interested in the class content, not how to use the internet, a skill i learned how to use when I was 5 …”

It was difficult to convince the students that the blog was considered a tool in the learning process, much like writing a paper in other courses. The blogging itself started slowly with students unsure about what they should write and frustrated because they were not given more instruction. The teaching team tried to explain a number of times that the blog afforded them freedom to write what they found interesting, but it seemed difficult for most of the students to accept this. Posts remained short and usually reflected something said by the instructor or in the readings. The students seemed reluctant to post because they were afraid what they were writing was not “correct” or “what was expected of them.”

Commentary showed similar difficulties. Students were reluctant to comment on each other’s work in any meaningful way, even if it only meant moving the original author’s point forward. Most comments were in agreement, or to offer some emotional response to the Original Post (e.g. “wow!,” “really?,” “that’s terrible/interesting.”) It was very rare for a post to have more than one or two comments (the highest was four which only happened twice) and an original author never returned to respond to the comments left on their post

Students were also unsure how to use links. Initially many of the students used links in ways that reflect how links are often used them on social network sites - for interesting “Youtube” or other types of videos on the web that were becoming extremely popular or they wanted to become extremely popular (e. g., babies dancing). This was not “incorrect” within the framework of the blogging assignment, but it was missing the intent – the ability to find new information that supports an Original Post or a comment. There was a reward for exceptional links, and those links were sometimes highlighted by the instructor in class. But there was a great disparity between good/interesting links and links for the sake of linking, and most of the links fell into the latter category.

On the more positive side, the blog seemed to help establish a sense of community among the students. Many students seemed to enjoy sharing their ideas with their classmates and would often end their Original Post with a phrase such as “what do you guys think?” There were almost no negative interactions between students. The blog managers (TAs) removed one blog post out of over two thousand. There were some controversial, often volatile topics raised (e.g., abortion, gay rights) but the discourse around these topics remained cordial and respectful. There was no use of offensive language or links to disagreeable content. Not one participant used the blog to shock or draw attention. The students seemed to understand almost intuitively the rules of conduct in this type of open forum.

It also became apparent that “chemistry” and “momentum” were important parts of the blogging process. Because of the size of the class (approximately 120 students) we were forced to split students randomly between two equal size community blogs. Yet one blog had close to 50% more posts than the other blog. Also types of posts tended to be cyclical and contagious in terms of topic and the length of posts. There would be a number of similar one or two sentence posts in a row and then there would be a number of longer, more thoughtful posts in a row. Blogging, like many other Internet tools, seems to have a viral component. This was a phenomenon the teaching team did not anticipate or plan for.

During regularly schedule teaching team meetings topics were dominated by student hostility and reluctance to blog. The TAs argued that blogging activities should be re-designed to better reflect non-educational online activities, suggesting a re-examination of norms of classroom teaching in the context of new technology use. The professor listened to the TAs but also became defensive about basic objectives of the class and the best ways to achieve them. The activities that did not meet expectations, such as lack of negative interactions and the viral nature of posting were treated as pleasant surprises and little more.

Documenting the changes in behavior and failure of espouse theories through single loop learning

This initial attempt to integrate blogs as a central component of a large, undergraduate class created change, some of which was expected and much of which was not. Most of the students never really acclimated to blogging within the confines of the governing variables established by the teaching team and were never really given a chance to change their theories-in-use about norms, goals and expectations of the class. The postings were usually short (just enough to fulfill requirements) and lacked depth. There were also limited links to credible sources to back up claims (most links were in separate, single posts). As one student wrote in a final blog post,

“As I write my final blog entry, I wanted to comment on how incredibly easy this class has been. I've never been in a class where it is so easy to get an A, and probably never will again. I liked the structure of the blog and how we didn't have to write papers, and I liked being able to write in the blog on my own time.”

It is interesting that almost all students in the department (and we assume across a number of educational settings) bring laptops or some other web connected tool to lectures. Students say that they are using the laptops for notes but many professors claim that they are connected into social network sites (e.g., Facebook). Even though students are extremely comfortable with the web and use web access tools in educational settings, they can be very reluctant to integrate their Internet activities into their educational activities. The teaching team began to realize the governing variables the students were using for their classroom activity were very different than the ones they referred to in their everyday online activities, even when they were done in the exact same place.

Initial challenges to governing variables

The teaching team met and discussed the previous course for a month between quarters. The second class would be smaller (only about eighty students who were all placed on a single community blog), but other than that the two classes were comparable in majors, gender distribution, age distribution, and even meeting time. Even though the classes were so similar we started with a very different problem: rather than developing strategies for introducing blogs into classroom activities, we were now trying to figure out how governing variables of the classroom was affecting instructor and student activities.

The initial innovation for the new course was concentrated on introducing the concepts and processes of blogging in a cooperative and as open manner as possible – attempting to redefine classroom relationships in the context of blogging. Believing from previous experience that good/interesting blogging is contagious, the team devised a strategy for making it an activity that was done both within class and outside traditional boundaries of the classroom (with as fuzzy of a dividing line as possible). The out-of-class blogging assignment would have no competition and no rewards for best posts, comments, and links, and no specific requirements for posting – both of which seemed to reinforce traditional educational themes in the first class. If the blog was going to develop it would have to do so bottom up through intrinsic motivations, with the students taking the lead in defining the blog and creating their own community through their posts (rather than having structure and extrinsic motivations offered to them, or imposed on them by the instructor). A major in-class blogging activity was included. The in-class activity would be split in two parts. The first part was a general lecture on the subject of the day. During the second part the students would meet in randomly organized groups (ranging between seven and nine students) and blog a response to one of a series of open-ended questions about the lecture topic. The split classroom was intended as a direct challenge to the teaching team’s governing variables for classroom activity (e.g., instructor led, carefully directed activities with specific aims). It also was an attempt to put more control of the activity in the hands of the students, allowing them the chance to bring new types of norms and objectives into the classroom.

The process of change in the second loop

Whereas consequences of single loop learning are relatively quick and definite, double loop explorations tend to be more process oriented and forward looking explorations (any finding is a jumping off point for the next problem). There were some important, initial results to the more open approach to technology infusion. One advantage of the group blogging innovation was that it changed the relationship of both students and teachers to blogging activities. The instructor no longer commented directly on any of the posts, but students at the very least got to see and discuss the group posts when they wrote them, and again when they were presented to the class. There was a good deal of positive reinforcement (Skinner, 1953) for interesting and well-researched posts, through commenting and/or accolades from other groups. Students would show general interest not only in class, but also outside of the classroom through posting independent thoughts about the blogged topic afterwards.

As the class continued the traditional “field” of relationships became less dominant in interactions with lectures and even instructor initiated discussion topics becoming less and less important. The evolving relationships led to perhaps the most important innovation in the process, and the one that may best illustrated the way governing variables were evolving in response to blogging activities for both the teaching team and the students. The innovation was unplanned and occurred as a natural part of developing theories in use based in changing relationships. Even though the instructor stopped writing on the blog he continued to read student posts regularly. One of the individual posts was an extraordinary discussion of a recent incident in a student’s life; a friend had committed suicide due to bullying. The Original Post had a number of comments and a few follow-up posts. At the beginning of the next class the instructor put the Original Post on bullying on the screen in front of the room and diverged from the planned curriculum by doing a fifteen minute lecture on bullying and its antecedents. The quality of the blog posts went up dramatically after this impromptu lecture. The teaching team was forced to confront one of the most intractable governing variables; the role of the published curriculum in determining the direction of the class. Divergence from a traditional, pre-set subject based curriculum ¹ for teaching child development based to a trajectory set primarily by student blog postings seemed especially dangerous. The teaching team would be ceding direction of the class to the community at large.

There was an important discussion among the teaching team about which path to follow. It seemed that we were presented with an opportunity to change the class through second loop learning but also worried about what might happen to the class if we were not correct. The instructor eventually decided to make the activity a regular part of the class structure – read through the blog posts and choose one that was especially well-written and affecting (the impact could either be emotional or intellectual). The instructor would then lecture on the blog topic before moving on to the scheduled topic for the class. Improvement in the quality of blogging continued. The teacher(s) and students were together moving the theories in use closer to what was intended in the original intention of the blog centered classrooms through a process of community reorientation that moved both the teaching team and the students past prior belief systems. There seemed to be parallel curricula – the curriculum described in the official class syllabus, and an emergent curriculum developed by (often different) students who promoted topics of interest.

Teaching and learning during early part of the course, as well the earlier course described, were more governed by values in which the teacher is the originating and the gate-keeper for relevant knowledge on the subject. The teacher chooses primary and usually secondary sources of information (e.g. text book), determines emphasis and amount of time spent on each subject (syllabus), and whether the students have reached a pre-set standard of knowledge in that subject (tests). Decisions about how the class developed became over the quarter a joint project involving both students and teachers and far more dynamic. The governing values of the class from meeting a pre-defined standard about what should be learned to shared interests in what is being learned.

Energy continued to build on the blog until one week the posts were dominated by single a topic of interest. There were a number of well-written blog posts on issues of relationship abuse. As a result, the instructor decided to invite an expert on the subject to present her research to the class. The students listened politely to the presentation and asked a few questions. On the way out of the room the guest speaker wondered if she had somehow “lost” the class. The teaching team was confused and frustrated by the lack of response from the students. However what happened soon after helped to illustrate the differentiation of governing variables and how this impacted the guest speaker’s (and the teaching team’s) expectations. The next day the blog “exploded” with long posts responding to the presentation and actually moving far beyond to related issues. Almost all of the Original Posts contained relevant, original links that readers could follow. One illustrative, though relatively short, response OP,

“While searching for articles related to teen dating violence, I found an interesting blog that was completely on teen dating violence. It has many interesting articles that I believe everyone would enjoy reading. Although some posts are graphic, it talks about real situations that everyone should be aware of because it is reality. Check it out! http://thesafespaceorg.blogspot.com/”

The above quote shows how students were not only introducing their own related topics, but also providing resources for other students who might be interested, completely separate from the instructor and the syllabus. The class and the blog had merged, creating a new type of teaching/learning space where all members of the community were potentially owners of the classroom experience, willing to take both chances and responsibility for learning of their peers.

Trying to understand where the second loop might take us

The community blog and the class atmosphere in general, worked far better in the second course than in the first. We believe this occurred because we moved from a single loop learning model of problem solving where we were trying to continuously readjust the blog (as if it was a thermostat) to attempting to open up the system of relationships that make up the classroom experience. The second loop learning process led to an “unfreezing” of norms and objectives on the part of the teaching team – and a consequent unfreezing among the students. But this “unfreezing” only occurred within a larger process – students felt safe enough to write and comment on a powerful post – the instructor recognized the post as an important watermark in the classroom development – students responded positively to the new direction – and the teaching team decided to directly challenge what had previously been considered sacrosanct governing variables (e.g., diverging from the curriculum). A lesson of the second loop was that blogging is not an addendum to traditional classroom curricula and therefore is not an innovation that we can learn how to use through simple adjustment strategies. If we are going to realize the potential of these new, pervasive tools in the classroom, it is important to build the class activities in the context of (changing) governing variables and the way relationships and the field of educational inquiry may and does change.

The second course moved from using blogs as part of a hybrid model of course to using the new technology as a means for creating a collective intelligence learning experience. In a hybrid model of course instruction the teacher (or teaching team) often uses blogging as an addendum to course instruction to foster student reflection on subjects being taught (Yang, 2009) or peer to peer dialogue (Deng & Yuen, 2011). Creation of collective intelligence suggests more of an Open Source model (Glassman & Kang, 2012) where teachers and students become co-owners in development of the course, and teaching/learning processes, as an original project. The move from hybrid learning to a more Open Source model began to change participants’ underlying governing variables for educational activities. The goal in the second course was not to teach the same course, based on that same norms and objectives that are used in a traditional classroom but in a different way. Instead, the new technology was used as a teaching/learning process that could take the course as a field of social relationships, in new directions.

The in-class group blogging immediately challenged closely held norms about how a classroom should be structured. Many of the students mentioned they usually did not like group projects but this was different because they had so much control over content and presentation. Most students (over 90%) already had experience with interactive nature of online communication. A big difference is when individuals use blogs they are taking risks (there is no “wall” to hide behind) – both in opening up their thinking to others, many of whom they may not know, and opening themselves up to new ways of knowing. The chance for students to work together in developing early posts while having the opportunity to interact with the instructor seemed to open them up to new types of governing variables, perhaps partially imported from their everyday online experiences. The following post came near the end of class from one of the groups actually suggesting how the final examination should be conducted.

“We looked up John Dewey and he believes that students thrive in an environment where they are allowed to experience and interact with the curriculum, and all students should have the opportunity to take part in their own learning. Because of this and Dewey's beliefs on democracy in the classroom, we believe that our final should be on the last day of normal scheduled classes or should at least be open to debate if the rest of the class does not agree. This would alleviate the time between finals, so we can focus on one exam at a time.”

This post received by far the most comments of any post in either class (19), with many groups and individual students offering input and their own views on the final. The next class included a discussion on Dewey’s ideas of democracy in the classroom and their meaning in the context of the discussion. The class had in that moment come full circle, with students promoting the Deweyan philosophy that had been at the heart of the original espoused theory for development of the blog centered course.

This second course was much more about using the ten weeks to develop a small, emergent community/culture where members could influence each other in action rather than move in established trajectories – and developing the types of underlying relationships that would allow this to occur. The teaching team making a commitment early on to experiment with classroom norms seemed to be a critical component of success. It was also surprising how important it was to remove competition from the blogging process. The competition implemented in the first course was meant to increase blogging by offering traditional incentives for participation, but may have actually worked against building a community blog by tapping into specific, well experienced governing variables. The blog in the second course was not only more active, and provided more thoughtful posts, but the students communicated with each other more. The students still engaged in little meaningful communication through comments (getting students to comment on each other’s work continues to be a barrier because it would require students to think differently about peer relationships in a classroom context), but there were series of Original Posts on the same subject with authors referring to earlier posts on the subject.

Perhaps the best way to explain the change in governing variables of the second class as it progressed is to use the metaphor developed by Eric Raymond (2001) – The Cathedral and the Bazaar. In describing the development of new projects Raymond suggested that (what we are calling) governing variables resembled those of a cathedral. Critical information as sacrosanct and static, there is a strict hierarchical, linear quality in product based relationships. There is little questioning of ideas, especially those coming from the top of the hierarchy. The bazaar suggests an open market place for ideas in which any individual can open up an outpost to hawk their wares. All ideas are potentially equal and product development can move in almost any direction based on the quality of different ideas at the moment. The governing variables of the bazaar are far more chaotic, but far more open and based in individual agency. The same metaphor we believe can be applied to the classroom: it can function based on the governing variables of a cathedral where the teacher is at the top of the hierarchy and the students sit in the pews, or it can function based on the governing variables of the bazaar. We suggest that the blog helped the second class move in the direction of the bazaar.

The most important innovation of the second course was almost certainly when the instructor gave up dependence on the pre-defined curriculum and started using blog posts to drive the course trajectory. The students actually became co-owners of the course, not only in word but in deed. The willingness of the students to engage topics, and engage each other, increased dramatically. Blog discussion was very different from many classroom centred discussions. First, the blogs were more pluralistic. It wasn’t only a few students (with ambiguous motivations) driving discussion. Many different voices emerged on the blog based on interest. Discussion was less about either pleasing or arguing with the instructor, and seemed more geared towards self-expression. This was especially apparent after the guest lecture. Students were forthright and thoughtful in ways rarely seen even in the most open class discussions. Original Posts started to combine the best qualities of class discussion and research papers: many of the posts reflected the passion and intensity you often find in the best class discussions (and usually in small, seminar type classes that foster this type of interaction). Students were also cognizant of the fact that they needed to offer some outside validity to the ideas they were attempting to express. The Original Posts with the best links were almost always the ones that got responses, and drove the direction of the course.

Blogging: A different type of educational community

Much of the research on computers in education, almost from the beginning, has been tied the idea of computer as “helper” or as “co-teacher,” helping achieve preconceived educational goals more easily and efficiently; often with little thought to how this might change the governing variables of traditional educational activities. The readable/writable web suggests different and perhaps more intimidating possibilities. Computers, in particular the Internet, may change the way we communicate with each other, may change the way we problem solve, may change the way that we think, and if so, should fundamentally change the ways in which we educate. Blogging has already emerged as an important new activity for many, one with the potential of shaking pre-conceptions and expectations about the way we think about intelligence and relationships to each other in the context of intelligence (e.g. Glassman & Kang 2012). Yet, at least in documented research, blogging has had a minor impact at best in education.

Action science with its roots in both fields of human interaction and participatory democracy may emerge as one of the best approaches for understanding emerging technologies in a human context. In his seminal article introducing the phrase Web 2.0 O’Reilly (2007) suggests the new applications of the web fundamentally change the quality of human interaction in goal directed activities. These new possibilities have already clashed with traditional underlying norms and objectives in business and commerce with many organizations turning defensive rather than exploring the ramifications of these underlying changes – leading to many of the differences between Web 1.0 and Web 2.0 thinking. If we just try and adjust to the new realities of the readable/writable web we will be unable to use them to their potential and quite possibly fail. It is critical that organizations recognize the flaws in their governing variables in the context of Web 2.0; especially true for decision makers whose value and self-identification is so often tied to traditional relationships (Trist et. al, 193).

Perhaps nowhere is defensiveness and defaulting to single loop learning more prevalent than in education. No matter how often theories of change are discussed it never seems to impact in place governing variables. The problems raised by integration of technology into the classroom are urgent, not least because they already are such a large part of student activities outside of the classroom: activities in which the students are highly successful and are in the process of developing their own governing variables. Educators may have to come to terms with the three options faced by the teaching team in this paper: abandon the technology, face a continuous stream of problems and likelihood of failure, or challenge the underlying variables of traditional educational institutions that determine action. The third is the most challenging and frustrating but also the most critical for success. Action science and double loop learning offer a viable pathway for pursuing the third option.