Reflective writing that the student controls —
including whether the instructor may read it.
Reflective journals are standard in ethnic studies and oral history courses, and they carry a familiar problem: the most honest entry is often the one a student would not want graded. A student who has just been asked by their grandmother not to record an interview is thinking about something worth thinking about — and may not want to hand it in.
On ECO every journal entry carries its own visibility, set by the student: private, or shared with the instructor. There is no third option, no class-wide broadcast, and no setting an instructor can override. A private entry is not hidden behind a permission check the instructor could ask IT to lift — it is not served.
This page is a demonstration of that. One of the four entries below is private, and its text is withheld here for the same reason it is withheld from the instructor.
A student who cannot write honestly will write something else.
A journal belongs to the student who writes it. The instructor sees an entry when the student submits it, and not before. Unsubmitted notes are visible to nobody.
The point is the working record — what an interview actually felt like, what a relative refused to answer, the question still unresolved. Research that only records conclusions loses the part worth teaching.
A journal entry about a grandmother stays inside the course network. It does not appear in the student’s family network, and their family cannot read it.