Welcome ManualPACKBACK ANSWERS STUDENTS

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Every problemcan be solved by asking the right question.

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Welcome to Packback Answers!

SECTION ONE

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LETTER FROM THE FOUNDERS

Welcome to Packback Answers!We believe that every problem can be solved by asking the right question. The bigger

the problem, the more important it is to ask great questions that help inspire others to search

for an answer. We’re facing so many big-picture questions in our world right now; how can we

make education work in the modern day? How can we preserve our environment in the face of

a growing population? What are the moral implications of starting a “sharing economy”? The list

goes on...

Packback Answers (funny enough) isn’t about answers. It’s about questions. It’s about helping

you take the information you learn in the classroom and turn it into lifelong knowledge. It’s

about empowering you to ask the BIG, HUGE questions...and know there’s always an answer.

We’re a student-founded, student-run company with a mission to help every college student get

more out of their education, while spending less. And we take that mission seriously. When you

purchase Packback Answers for a class, it’s our job to make sure you’re getting a whole lot more

value out of the platform than what you paid for it.

We’re here to make sure your questions get answered, help you discover interesting new

articles and videos, and understand why what you’re learning in class actually matters. Your

professor and classmates will be using the platform and will be able to answer many of your

questions, but we are here to help whenever you need us!

An education shouldn’t just be about memorizing facts for a test...it should give you real

wisdom for the future, empower you to start solving the BIG problems, and inspire you!

Mike, Kasey and JessicaCOFOUNDERS OF PACKBACK

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THE PACKBACK STORY

Our mission is to help every student get more out of their education, while spending less.Packback was founded by four students

at Illinois State University in 2012 who

were sick of spending hundreds of dollars

every semester on textbooks they rarely

ever opened. Packback’s student founders

wanted to create a solution that would

allow students to get more value out of

their textbooks (and their education) while

bringing down costs.

The founders saw innovative methods of

renting other content on-demand (Netflix,

Redbox, Itunes) and innovative ways of

collaborating online (Slack, Wikipedia,

Facebook) and decided to bring these

two concepts together and apply them to

education.

The result? Super affordable eTextbooks

with an interesting, engaging layer of

trackable student discussion on top.

In March of 2014, we aired on the TV show

Shark Tank, where Packback’s concept and

mission was seen by 8.5 Million viewers!

Not only did we land an investment from

Mark Cuban, we also started getting dozens

of emails from students telling us how

much they hated spending tons of money

every semester on textbooks and how

much they believed in Packback. Since our

start, we have helped over 135,000 students

save $14 Million total on their textbooks.

And we’re just getting started!

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What to post in Packback Answers

SECTION TWO

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BEST PRACTICES FOR GREAT ENGAGEMENT

What to post in Packback AnswersOn Packback Answers, you earn points for asking questions! That means you can help your

grade by asking for help, or asking about a concept that inspired you from class!

What’s great to post in Packback Answers

Closed-ended “Extra Help” Questions (that show their work!)

When you ask for extra help, you should explain exactly where you got stuck, and

the “answerer” should explain how they arrived at the answer. When you show your

work, your question becomes a helpful resource for other students, too.

Open-ended “Discussion” Questions

Questions that start with, “How might we...” or “What might happen if...” leave

room for many answers and push everyone to think about the BIG problems!

Sharing great resources that spark curiosity

Found a great resource that inspires you? Share it with your Study Group in

Packback Answers. If it sparked your curiosity, it will spark your classmates’ too!

X What Packback moderators will remove:

Anything too “class specific”, incorrect answers or obvious cheating

Examples of overly class specific questions include, “Is class canceled today?” or

“What’s the answer to #4?”. We’ll remove these, along with incorrect answers.

Duplicate answers to questions with only one “right” answer

If it can be Googled in 10 seconds, it’s not a good discussion question. Packback will

remove any duplicate answers or questions that are clearly just for points.

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BEST PRACTICES FOR GREAT ENGAGEMENT

What does a “great” question look like?

Why is this such an awesome question?

It leaves room for great discussion

With open-ended questions, every student in a Study Group can provide a unique

answer, influenced by their own perspective. Packback Answers is great for getting extra

help outside of class, but it’s also a great way to spark valuable, interesting conversations!

It takes a topic from class...and introduces interesting resources to spark curiosity

When a topic in class sparks a your curiosity, you can share other videos, articles, links and

resources that are related to that topic. This lets you earn points for exploring the

topics that interest you and sharing your discoveries with your classmates!

It focuses on the application of knowledge (not just the collection of information)

By focusing on how the content being taught in class can be applied to real-world situations

and problems...it makes you think about why you are learning something in class.

Questions on Packback Answers can help you gain real experience for the future by

applying class learning to real-world problems, moral situations, and examples.

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BEST PRACTICES FOR GREAT ENGAGEMENT

Recommended resources & readingInspired by what inspires people? Curious about curiosity? Want to learn about learning?

Check out our recommended reading list to discover cool resources, opinions, essays,

articles images and videos to share with your Study Group on Packback Answers:

On the power of great questions, knowledge and education:Design Thinking (via IDEO)

Cool educational videos on Ted-Ed

The writings of Maria Popova on Brainpickings.com

Ideas Worth Sharing on TED.com

Great sources for cool articles, blogs, videos and images:

Science, Math & Tech

Howstuffworks.com

Nasa.com

Discovery.com

Smithsonian.com

Stackoverflow.com

Reddit.com

Business, News & Politics

WSJ.com

Quora.com

MIT open courseware

Entrepreneur.com

Investopedia.com

Art & Design

Underconsideration.com

Designmilk.com

PSFK.com

Fromupnorth.com

theawwwards.com

metmuseum.org

Humanities & Liberal Arts

Youarenotsosmart.com

themillions.com

Page-Turner by the New Yorker

Bigthink.com

Goodreads.com

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About Packback Answers: Features

SECTION THREE

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ABOUT PACKBACK ANSWERS

Asking QuestionsQuestion Search Autocomplete

Begin typing their question, and immediately see a drop down of questions with similar

keywords. This helps you find the answers you are looking for quickly and avoid posting

duplicate questions. Start typing anything to see matches to your question.

Embed images videos, or attach files to Questions

You can attach multiple types of files to a question including images, videos, files and links.

You and your classmates can share interesting related videos, articles, and images to start a

discussion or even share your own classwork through the platform to be discussed.

Max file size: 1 MB per attachment

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ABOUT PACKBACK ANSWERS

Asking Questions (cont.)Text Editor for Questions

Our question editor supports regular, bold, italic, underlined and hyperlinked text- great

for formatting questions to be clear and legible. It’s super simple, but gives you access to all the

primary text editing features you’re used to in any word processor.

Direct Questions

Want to send a question directly to a someone in your class? The Direct Question feature

allows you tag an individual user in the question and send them an email notification that they

have received a direct question. You can use this to send questions directly to your professor,

or group members on a project or a partner on a project. If your professor hosts Office Hours

on Packback Answers in your Study Group, you are able to direct questions to them by using

the “Direct a Question” feature on Packback Answers.

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ABOUT PACKBACK ANSWERS

Posting AnswersUpvoting and Downvoting

The “Upvoting” & “Downvoting” features on Packback Answers allows you to moderate your

own Study Group. Answers with “Downvotes” are investigated by our moderation team.

Answers with “Upvotes” give the author 15 Reputation Points; rewarding great answers.

“Best Answer” Selection

On Packback Answers, we want to push everyone to think deeply and put effort into crafting

a thoughtful, useful answer. To reward very helpful or insightful answers, we introduced the

“Best Answer” feature. There are two ways for a you to have your answer selected as “Best”;

the author of the original question can select your answer manually as “Selected Best”, or the

group can upvote the answer, and the answer with the most upvotes is “Voted Best.”

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ABOUT PACKBACK ANSWERS

Posting Answers (cont.)Embed images videos, or attach files to Answers

You can embed videos and images or attach files to an answer on Packback Answers, just like

you can on questions. This feature allows for rich content right in the discussion feed.

Max attachment size: 1 MB

Cite sources in Answers

Each answer submission form has a field to allow you to cite your source for your answer, if you

have one. This is a great way to show your professor that you are using verified sources, and

discover where your classmates are finding helpful content.

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ABOUT PACKBACK ANSWERS

SubscriptionsSubscribe to a Study Group to receive notifications

You can subscribe to your class’s textbook Study Group to receive email notifications when new

questions have been posted, when their questions receive an email, and more. This makes it

easy to know what activity is happening in your class study group immediately, without having

to constantly log in and check the group.

This feature helps you get your questions get answered quickly. In fact, subscriptions

have helped to bring the average “answering time” (how long it takes on average to

receive an answer) on Packback Answers down to just 2 Hours!

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ABOUT PACKBACK ANSWERS

Gamification FeaturesReputation Points

You earn “Reputation Points” for participation, including logging in, asking a question,

answering a question, voting on an answer, getting a “thumbs up” on your answer, and having

your answer selected as best. You can also earn Reputation Points for collecting Knowledge

Badges! Read the Badges section to learn more.

Here is a breakdown of Reputation Points on Packback Answers:

Activity

Joining Packback Answers

Daily Participation

Asking a question

Answering a question

Voting on an answer

Earning a “Thumbs Up” vote

Having an answer “Selected Best”

Earning a Knowledge Badge

Earning the “Top-of-the-Class” Badge

Points Earned

2 Reputation Points

5 Reputation Points

10 Reputation Points

10 Reputation Points

3 Reputation Points

15 Reputation Points

25 Reputation Points

100 Reputation Points

250 Reputation Points

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ABOUT PACKBACK ANSWERS

Gamification FeaturesLevel Badges

Level Badges are earned automatically by passing certain levels of Reputation Points. You move

up through the various college grade levels and graduation honor designations...ultimately

working towards the Summa Cum Laude badge on Packback Answers!

Freshman BadgeEARNED AT 10 POINTS

Cum Laude BadgeEARNED AT 500 POINTS

Magna Cum Laude BadgeEARNED AT 1000 POINTS

Summa Cum Laude BadgeEARNED AT 1500 POINTS

Sophomore BadgeEARNED AT 50 POINTS

Freshman BadgeEARNED AT 150 POINTS

Senior BadgeEARNED AT 300 POINTS

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ABOUT PACKBACK ANSWERS

Gamification FeaturesKnowledge Badges

Knowledge Badges are awarded for outstanding performance. Our system rewards students

who show exceptional performance in the platform for their content quality, their interesting

resources, thought processes, consistency and helpfulness to their classmates.

When a you receive a Knowledge Badge, you’ll receive a badge on your user profile as

well as a Reputation Point award.

The Question Master BadgePOINT AWARD: 100 POINTS

Awarded for posting an exceptional, thought provoking question that receives

a large number of responses from the community. Open-ended, problem-

focused questions create great, deep discussions and are rewarded!

The Know-It-All BadgePOINT AWARD: 100 POINTS

Awarded for posting an amazing answer that receives a large number of views

and/or upvotes. The answer must be detailed and accurate, but also challenge

the question-asker to think more deeply about the subject.

The Bookworm BadgePOINT AWARD: 100 POINTS

Awarded for providing an awesome connection to the textbook and citing a

page number or chapter. Keeping the discussion focused around the content

of the textbook helps keep the whole community on track!

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ABOUT PACKBACK ANSWERS

Gamification FeaturesKnowledge Badges (cont.)

The Link King BadgePOINT AWARD: 100 POINTS

Awarded to a student who shares an exceptional resource (link, article, video,

image) that adds value to the discussion and inspires their classmates to want

to learn more. The resource should be unique, entertaining and unexpected!

The Great Debater BadgePOINT AWARD: 100 POINTS

Awarded to a student who sparks an enriching debate. In the real world, there

is often no one “right” answer...we want to reward students who think outside

the box and challenge their peers to think about things differently.

The Study Buddy BadgePOINT AWARD: 100 POINTS

Awarded for being a power-answerer in a Study Group and being an awesome

“study buddy” to classmates. Awarded to students who post good answers

quickly to new questions at any time of day.

The Free Thinker BadgePOINT AWARD: 100 POINTS

Awarded to a student who finds a connection between the what they learned

in class, and another subject or real-world problem. The Free Thinker Badge is

given to students thinking about how to apply their knowledge for good.

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ABOUT PACKBACK ANSWERS

Gamification FeaturesKnowledge Badges (cont.)

The “Top-of-the-Class” BadgePOINT AWARD: 250 POINTS

The Top-of-the-Class badge is the highest Knowledge Badge that is awarded

and is given to students who embody our values of lifelong learning, insatiable

curiosity, passionate sharing of knowledge and discovery.

The Leaderboard

Each Study Group tracks that group’s top 5 contributors, visible in the leaderboard on the

right hand side of the home feed page. This feature allows you to have to see which students

have the most reputation points in your class study group. Click into any of the user’s profiles

right from the leaderboard to see exactly how many questions and answers they’ve provided,

how many points they have and any badges they’ve earned.

This leaderboard updates constantly, providing the most up-to-date insight into the top

students in your class. Some professors reward top students...but even if not, it’s fun to make it

on the leaderboard!

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ABOUT PACKBACK ANSWERS

User ProfilesThe Anatomy of a User Profile

1. Activity Module

View a users’s “paper trail”. See the questions asked, answers given, and any answers that have

been selected as “best” by clicking the links in the Activity Module.

2. Recognition Module

View a user’s Reputation Points breakdown, Badges and Expertise details with this module.

3. Direct a Question to this User

The “Direct Question” feature is accessed by navigating to a user’s profile page and clicking

this button, which opens a new question form and notifies the ‘tagged’ user after submitting.

4. Reputation Summary Module

View a user’s Reputation Points and Rank at a glance with the Reputation Summary module.

5. Badges Summary Module

See a selection of a user’s recently earned badges. Click the “See All” link to see more.

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ABOUT PACKBACK ANSWERS

Get in touch with the Packback teamThe Packback team is here to help any time you need us. We never respond to requests with

canned responses: we read and respond to every question and request as it comes in directly.

These Packback Answers team members are here to help:

Have a question or concern? Need help getting access to Packback? Forgot your password? Just want to chat?

Email Holla@packbackbooks.com for help.

Email us directly and we’ll be happy to help immediately!

Kasey Gandham

Founder | COO & President

518.207.7642

Jessica Tenuta

Founder | Head of Product

630.740.5474

Mike Shannon

Founder | CEO

630.336.8959