ONLINE ANNEX — running the Citizens' Assembly in a Box on a video call
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One page. Any video tool your room already uses. The same evening, online.
This annex turns the Citizens’ Assembly in a Box evening into an online one. It exists because the honest answer to “what platform do we need?” is: none you don’t already have. The tools that matter are the rules, not the software. The people who run online deliberation for a living report the same thing plainly: moving a good room onto a video call without redesigning the technique is what fails — the technique is this page.
Kids welcome. Food shared. Nobody pays. (Online too: kids can sit in; everyone brings their own snack to the screen; nothing here costs anything.)
What you need
- Any video-call tool your room already uses that has breakout rooms (Zoom, Google Meet, Jitsi — whatever is familiar; familiarity beats features).
- One shared document everyone can open (Google Doc or any equivalent) — this is your wall.
- The main kit, read once: the question rules, the mixed-tables rule, the facilitator’s card, and the three-column record all apply unchanged.
- 12 to 30 people, 2.5 hours, a real question with a real recipient — exactly as in the main kit.
The translations — room to screen
| In the room | On the call |
|---|---|
| Mixed tables of 4–6 | Breakout rooms of 4–6, assigned by the host, never random-only — mix ages and viewpoints, split people who know each other. Assign them before the call from the signup list if you can. |
| Silent cards, 5 minutes | Everyone writes alone, cameras off if they like, in a private note — then sends it to the facilitator in a direct message (or a form). Not in the group chat: nobody’s card should anchor anyone else’s. |
| Reading a sample back | Facilitator reads a spread of cards aloud, anonymous, before any discussion opens — same rule, same reason: the quiet get heard before the loud. |
| The wall | The shared doc, with the three-column record (WHERE WE AGREE · WHERE WE DIVIDE · WHAT WE’D NEED TO KNOW) as its only structure. The facilitator holds the keyboard; the room supplies the words. |
| Cross-pollination shuffle | Re-assign half of each breakout room at the halfway mark — thirty seconds of admin for the most valuable five minutes of the evening. |
| The harvest | Everyone opens unitetolove.ca/harvest on their own device in the last five minutes — online, the QR is just a link. If the online form isn’t live yet, the shared doc holds a harvest section — the doc is the record, nothing is lost. |
Three online-only rules
- The chat is not the room. Side-chat during someone’s speaking turn is the online way the loud drown the quiet. Ask for it plainly at the open: reactions yes, running commentary no. The facilitator’s “who hasn’t spoken yet?” matters more on a call — ask it every round, by name if needed, since screens make silence invisible.
- Phones are seats. Anyone who can join only by phone audio is a full participant — the facilitator reads the doc’s key lines aloud whenever it changes, so nobody needs the screen to follow the wall.
- Recording follows the room’s own rule, decided at the start, said out loud. Online makes recording one click — which is exactly why it must be a decision, never a default. No recording without the whole call hearing it announced.
When your room outgrows this page
Purpose-built platforms for online assemblies exist and are worth knowing: some are access-by-request research tools, some are in beta, some cost real money — and a true citizens’ assembly (lottery-selected, stratified, professionally run — the gold standard the main kit names) is a different undertaking from this evening at any scale. This page is the honest first tier: your own call, your own doc, these rules. When a room runs this three times and wants more, that is a good problem, and the main kit’s honesty box says where to look.
Translate this kit
Translate this kit — a one-page translation is itself a civic act. Priority languages (per the multilingual program, pending census confirmation): Cantonese, Mandarin, Punjabi, Urdu, Tagalog, Spanish, Tamil, Italian, Portuguese, Korean, Vietnamese, Arabic, Farsi, Bengali. Send translations through the same link.
A free, open kit. Copy it, change it, translate it, make it yours. — uniteTOlove.ca