Your participant pool doesn't have to end at your campus.
Collectiv connects your department to a shared network of student participants across universities. By academics, for academics.
10 Early Adopter spots · Fall 2026
Your department's participant pool is limited to your campus.
Hundreds of thousands of students across the US earn research credit every semester. And yet your department samples from one school.
Uniform samples limit your research. Valuable participant time is wasted on filler studies, while elsewhere real studies go unfilled. Departments share the same problem, but solve it alone.
The Common Pool
Think of it like interlibrary loan, but for research participants. Your department's students join the pool, and in return your researchers can recruit from every other participating university.
Your department joins the network
You choose which online studies to share with the Common Pool. In-person studies stay local. Manage everything from our participant management software.
Students complete studies across campuses
Your students see eligible studies from every participating university alongside your own. They earn credit at your school regardless of who posted the study.
The fairness algorithm keeps it balanced
We track and algorithmically balance participant contributions and completions across the network. The more studies students from your department complete, the more participants your studies get.
Who makes sure this stays fair?
The Common Pool is modeled on Elinor Ostrom's principles for governing shared resources — the work that won her the Nobel Prize. Every department has a seat at the table, every exchange is transparent, and the rules are enforced algorithmically, not politically. If your students complete 100 credits of research across the network, your studies are eligible to receive 100 credits of participation in return.
A modern participant management system
Run online and in-person studies. We've made this seamless and intuitive — easier than existing participant management software. Designed to get out of your way so you can focus on research.
Design it. Post it. Done.
Fill in study information and go live. Easily post to the Common Pool.
Eligibility rules
Define criteria. See live updates of the number of eligible participants.
Social Perception & Decision Making
Investigate how social context influences perceptual judgments and decision-making processes in controlled lab settings...
Manage in-person sessions and attendance
Run studies for your department's students. Easy attendance marking.
Monday, February 17, 2026
Prescreen
Students complete a one-time questionnaire. Your studies are presented only to eligible participants.
1. Are you right-handed? *
Fairness, quantified
Common Pool metrics are provided for transparent tracking of the fairness algorithm in action.
Track participation
Real-time signups, completions, and no-shows at a glance.
Common Pool benefits for your department
- Resampling from a single-university participant pool
- Placeholder assignments so students can earn credit
- Risk of a tragedy-of-the-commons where individual studies deplete the shared participant pool
- Methods section: Recruited from a mid-sized Midwestern university
- Students only experience studies from their own department.
- Access a bigger, more diverse participant pool
- Real studies from active researchers across universities
- Algorithmic fairness that is automatic and transparent
- Methods section: Recruited from a diverse pool of students from universities across the US
- Students get exposure to research across universities.
Bigger pool. More diverse samples. Stronger findings.
When your participant pool is limited to one campus, so is your science. Collectiv gives you access to students from universities in the Common Pool: different regions, demographics, and backgrounds.
More generalizable results
Samples that span multiple universities produce findings that hold up beyond a single campus.
Recruit specific populations
Need left-handed student athletes or first-generation college students? A larger network makes it easier to find the participants you need.
Genuinely naive participants
Recruit participants who haven't been exposed to your research through coursework.
By academics. For academics.
Every semester, the same problem. The same participant pool. Outdated systems. Collectiv started because we lived that problem and realized the fix was not just better participant management software, but a shared network.
Emily Hangen, PhD
Wanting her job to be easier
Social psychologist and Assistant Professor. After having worked in psychology departments across 5 institutions, Emily began to see a common pattern: the existing systems for participant management could be better and by design, confined each department to its own campus population. Collectiv is her answer to this.
Forrest Hangen, PhD
Making her job easier
Former psychology major and former participant pool member. Forrest's PhD in Public Policy enabled him to see cross-university participant sharing as a common pool resource problem. As a Data Scientist and programmer, he gained the technical skills to build the platform. With Collectiv, he is building governance principles designed to keep shared resources sustainable and fair.
We're in this together. That's why we called it Collectiv.
Join
Sign up as an Early Adopter or contact us to learn more.
Preview
Explore the platform, set up your department, and start onboarding.
Go Live
Run your first studies on Collectiv. The Common Pool is open.
Be an Early Adopter. 50% off for two years. Price locked forever.
The first 10 departments get half-price access for two full years. After that, your rate locks in at the regular rate — no price increases, ever.
What your department gets
- 50% off for your first two yearsHalf-price and full access for two full years.
- Permanent price lockWhen the discount ends, your rate locks in at the regular rate — no price increases, ever.
- Intuitive setup and supportWe'll provide step-by-step tutorials and offer ongoing support. Your coordinator won't be left reading documentation alone.
What we ask in return
- Commit to the Fall 2026 pilot semesterJoin for Fall 2026 and experience the benefits of the Common Pool.
- Share feedback during the pilotYour feedback shapes what we build next. Make the platform work for you and fellow academics.
- Help us spread the wordAfter a successful pilot, let other departments hear about your experience.
We're happy to work around your budget cycle. Lock in pricing now, pay when the timing works for your department.
Simple, transparent pricing
Join the Common Pool for a bigger, more diverse participant pool. Or better manage your existing pool with our intuitive, modern participant management software.
COMMON POOL
Micro
Small departments
Up to 400 student accounts per year
- Management software included
- Common Pool access
- Network visibility dashboards
- Post online & in-person studies
- Study posting & timeslot management
- Credit & requirement tracking
- Student prescreen questionnaires
- Attendance & no-show tracking
- Reporting & CSV exports
SSO available upon request
COMMON POOL
Standard
Mid-size departments
Up to 1,000 student accounts per year
- Management software included
- Common Pool access
- Network visibility dashboards
- Post online & in-person studies
- Study posting & timeslot management
- Credit & requirement tracking
- Student prescreen questionnaires
- Attendance & no-show tracking
- Reporting & CSV exports
- Custom prescreen questions
- Priority support
SSO available upon request
COMMON POOL
Unlimited
Large departments
Unlimited student accounts per year
- Management software included
- Common Pool access
- Network visibility dashboards
- Post online & in-person studies
- Study posting & timeslot management
- Credit & requirement tracking
- Student prescreen questionnaires
- Attendance & no-show tracking
- Reporting & CSV exports
- Custom prescreen questions
- Priority support
- Advanced reporting
SSO available upon request
Early Adopter pricing (50% off) lasts 2 years, then transitions to a permanent loyalty price lock at the regular rate.
Get the Early Adopter Program guide
Share a few details to download the full program guide, including pricing, the Common Pool, and how to join the Fall 2026 cohort.
Frequently asked questions
Don't see your question? Reach out
The Common Pool
Your department opts in and chooses which online studies to share. Students from any participating university can complete those studies and earn credit at their home institution. Our fairness algorithm tracks participant contributions and completions to keep the exchange balanced across departments.
Access is proportional to contribution. If your students complete 100 credits of research across the network, your studies are eligible to receive 100 credits of participation in return. Our fairness algorithm ensures this automatically. You also have clear tracking of participation and how your studies are being presented on the platform.
In-person studies stay local to your campus. Only online studies are eligible for cross-university sharing.
Privacy & Security
None. No student data crosses university boundaries. Other universities only see study listings and aggregate participation counts. When a student from another university completes a study, the home institution receives credit for that participation, but no identifiable student information is shared with the study team or other universities on our platform.
Collectiv is designed to support FERPA compliance. Student education records stay within your university's data boundary, data is encrypted in transit and at rest, and access is controlled by role-based permissions. We sign a Data Processing Agreement with each institution.
US-hosted infrastructure. Encrypted in transit and at rest. Every data export and mutation is logged for auditing.
Migration & Setup
Yes. Collectiv is a full-featured participant management platform. You can do everything you need to run a participant pool locally: post studies, schedule timeslots, track credits, administer prescreen surveys, and set eligibility rules, with the added option of recruiting from the Common Pool.
Your coordinator uploads a list of university email addresses to create accounts in bulk by role (student, researcher, instructor). Everyone signs in with a one-time code sent to their university email — no passwords to create or remember. SSO available on request.
Collectiv does not change your IRB process. Studies still go through your institution's IRB as usual. The platform handles recruitment and credit tracking. We will provide language for using the Common Pool in your IRB applications.
Let's chat.
We're two people building something we believe in. Drop us a line. We'd love to hear from you.