Columbia's EdBlogs system turns the blogging concept on its head (or at least on its side). Rather than one author with many commenters, EdBlogs sites are normally set up with each student in the role of "author." This allows any student create and publish new posts directly, without approval from the instructor.

However, on occasion, the instructor might want to "gate" students' posts. This is especially true in cases where the instructor wants all students to respond to a prompt before making other students' posts public to the course.

To do this, the instructor can assign students the "contributor" role, which allows students to write posts but not publish them to the blog. Students cannot see the other contributors' posts (even via the blog's admin interface) until after they've been "bulk published" by the instructor.

To learn more about this technique (and myriad other options) faculty members can contact ccnmtl@columbia.edu and set up an appointment.