student resources

Everything on this page is also true of the app in front of you, so if you are stuck on a particular screen, the walkthroughs below show it drawn. If you are stuck on something the page does not cover, the help bot is faster than we are.

If you are using Sway for a class, log in at chat.swaybeta.ai. If you would rather see the whole thing than read about it, doing an assignment is a screen-by-screen walkthrough from the sign-up link to the survey at the end — and it is faster than this page. For anything urgent, the help bot answers nearly every student question and passes on what it cannot settle.

getting started

creating an account

Your instructor will give you a link to sign up with your official school email address. Within a few minutes you should get an email with instructions for activating the account. If it does not arrive, check your spam folder before assuming anything has gone wrong.

If your activation link expires, you can request a new one at any time by resetting your password.

log in: chat.swaybeta.ai
expired link: chat.swaybeta.ai/student/reset_password
questions: The Sway Student Help Bot — the first place to go, and the fastest.

who you get paired with

Sway pairs you with a classmate based on your answers to the opinion survey, and it aims to match you with somebody who disagrees with you. Sometimes you will be paired with someone who agrees; in that case one of you is asked to play devil's advocate and argue the side you do not personally hold.

SMS notifications

We strongly recommend turning on text-message reminders for deadlines, matches and messages — it is the single thing that most helps a pair coordinate. If you did not enable SMS when you signed up, you can turn it on under Settings at any time.

deadlines and opinions

You must submit your opinions by the assigned deadline, or you will not be able to take part. Sway will remind you by email and SMS. Do not ignore the reminders.

After you complete the opinion survey, Sway sends an email confirmation. If you have not received that confirmation, your opinions have not been registered. Go back to the platform and re-enter them before the opinion deadline. Two things cause this: an unstable wi-fi or mobile connection, and forgetting to press the Submit button at the bottom of the survey.

If Sway does not match you immediately, you will be matched at the opinion deadline, and you can begin chatting then.

chatting with your partner

agreeing how you will do it

The first thing you and your partner should do is agree on how and when you will complete the assignment. You might pick a time to both be online, or you might prefer to exchange messages over a few days. Either works. What matters is that you have agreed: you cannot make progress unless both of you are engaged and responding — to each other, and to Guide.

how long a chat takes

Chat length is governed by Sway's progress meter, which you will see in the main chat window. Both of you have to contribute for it to move. Once it reaches 100% you will get a personalized post-chat quiz, and you are free to keep chatting afterwards.

Chats are not strictly timed. Expect one to last approximately as long as your instructor's minimum duration if you do it in one sitting at a normal pace; asynchronous chats take somewhat longer in wall-clock time. We suggest not watching the meter. Your chat will go best when you are focused on the conversation.

Your progress reflects how well you are having a real conversation, not how much you write. Think of it as talking to someone in person, where you naturally take turns and respond to what they have just said.

what moves the meter

do this

Send a message, then wait for your partner to respond before you continue.
Actually respond to them. Don't just state your own views — talk about what they said.
Keep responses focused. Thoughtful but conversational; not mini-essays.
Both of you should talk roughly equally.

not this

Lots of quick, short messages sent to look more active.
Extremely long responses that leave your partner no room.
Ignoring what your partner said and pushing your own point again.

Stuck at 95%? That almost always means the chat needs more genuine back-and-forth. Check whether you have been sending several messages in a row without waiting, talking only about your own ideas rather than responding to theirs, or writing speeches instead of having a conversation.

assignments, credit and privacy

what your instructor can see

You should feel comfortable exploring and challenging even your most deeply held beliefs, so your chats are private: only you and your partner can read them. Sway does check automatically that the two of you are engaging productively with the assigned topic, and your instructor sees the result of those checks, along with your scores on the brief Understanding Quizzes you take after each chat.

Everything else shared with an instructor is de-identified, aggregated, or both. They do not receive your opinions, and they cannot read your transcript.

The full picture — what is collected, what is encrypted, what is shared and what you can switch off — is in student privacy and research consent.

getting credit

To receive credit for your chats, you have to allow your instructor to verify that you completed the assignments. If you did not grant that permission when you registered, you can change it under Settings.

Separately: if you did not allow de-identified research use when you created your account, please consider granting it later. Settings has a clear explanation of the privacy protections in place. It is genuinely optional, and it does not affect your credit either way.

Sway

Notifications

Email me when I have an assignment deadline in the next 24 hoursOn

Email me when I have forgotten about a messageOn

Permissions and sharing

Allow my instructor to verify that I have used SwayOn

Turning this setting on allows your instructor to see when you have finished an assignment. This does not allow your instructor to read your chats, but they will see your scores on quizzes and whether you and your partner remained on topic. If this setting is off, your email address and preferred first name are not revealed to your instructor.

Settings, where the notification and permission switches live. The instructor-verification switch is the one that has to be on for an assignment to count.

what "minimum duration" actually means

Your instructor sets a minimum duration for the assignment, but it will not exactly correspond to how long the chat takes you. Students send messages at different paces, and a chat can unfold asynchronously over days. So the minimum duration is an informed estimate of how long the discussion would take if you and your partner both sat down and exchanged messages of a typical length at a typical pace.

If your instructor sets 30 minutes, in other words, you do not need a continuous 30-minute back-and-forth. You can send messages at your own pace, and the assignment is marked complete once the chat is long enough that it would have taken about 30 minutes at a normal continuous pace. The estimate is least accurate the very first time you use Sway; it learns from how you use it and gets better in later assignments.

You will always know which chats are part of an assignment: they carry a deadline, a progress indicator, and a purple banner reading "Sway Discussion Assignment". The progress indicator does not update continuously — Sway refreshes it roughly every 10%.

Sway Discussion Assignment

Deadline: 2024-10-20 03:49
Progress: 0%

Concealing Birth Sex

System: Start your chat!

A chat that is part of a graded assignment is labelled at the top and carries its deadline and progress.

eight hints for hard conversations

Difficult conversations are challenging and, done well, extremely rewarding. These eight are the ones that make the most difference.

assume good faith: Approach the other person assuming they have good intentions, even where you disagree with them.
listen to understand: Ask non-judgmental questions — "what led you to your current view?" — rather than questions designed to catch someone out.
keep an open mind: Be willing to consider new information and to learn from the other side. It is fine to modify your position when the evidence is compelling.
ideas, not identities: Criticize arguments and positions. Never people or personal characteristics.
respectful language: Keep the discourse civil and constructive. Avoid insults, slurs and needlessly inflammatory rhetoric.
reasons, not feelings: Back your points with credible sources rather than emotional appeals. Disliking something is not an argument that it is wrong.
find common ground: Actively seek and acknowledge the valid points on the other side, even where you disagree on the whole.
know your limits: Some unease is usually a sign of growth. But if a dialogue turns counterproductive or hostile, it is fine to disengage respectfully.

Up next

Where to take a problem this page has not solved.