ST means Scratch team.

What do I mean by ‘checkpoint’?

When a checkpoint gets used, a Scratcher from the suggestion will compile all of the good development that's possible to get from the suggestion and then give this to one of the ST members. The development should be thoroughly explained so that it can be understood. A ‘checkpoint’ can only be used if at least five Scratchers agree to use one and must communicate that in the suggestion.

To perform this go to a ST member which can be found here: https://scratch-mit-edu.ezproxyberklee.flo.org/credits, and find one that has their comments open on their profile and use the ‘checkpoint’ there. When using a ‘checkpoint’, make sure that the ST member knows that this comment is a ‘checkpoint’. Once that ST member reads that comment then he or she will go to the suggestion and first check if at least five Scratchers agreed to use a checkpoint and then post if he or she supports it and why he or she does with any questions that he or she might have about the development and finally telling how many checkpoints the suggestion has left. If you are the one that uses a ‘checkpoint’ then make sure you leave a post on that suggestion that you are going to use a checkpoint first.

Why would a ‘checkpoint’ be useful?

A ‘checkpoint’ can be useful to get some insight from a ST member of possible problems with the suggestion. It can also help give a better idea of what to improve along with the ST being more familiar with the suggestion.

Details:

Each suggestion gets a max of three checkpoints and once all of the checkpoints get used, the Scratch team will need to officially decide if that suggestion will be rejected or implemented in a timely manner. How long a timely manner is going to be is something that will need to be agreed upon with the Scratch team.

If this does get implemented then it can help with suggestions development so that they don't take as long for the discussion to be rejected or implemented.

I’m 50/50 on this one.
While I feel that it would be very useful for people to understand why or why not their suggestions will be implemented, it also takes a lot of time up on the ST’s end.
It sounds like a good idea, but what if the ST members get so many messages that they can’t do this system? After all, last I heard, they’re a bit understaffed.
Besides, development takes time. Certain suggestions will need to be put through many people before it can be officially approved.

Like

TheAutocorrectingCat wrote:

I’m 50/50 on this one.
While I feel that it would be very useful for people to understand why or why not their suggestions will be implemented, it also takes a lot of time up on the ST’s end.
It sounds like a good idea, but what if the ST members get so many messages that they can’t do this system? After all, last I heard, they’re a bit understaffed.
-snip-

It is mostly moderation issues. You are correct, they are a group of 30 - 40 people managing the huge website that is Scratch.

To OP:

5 is too little and seems to be vulnerable to spam. Maybe change it to 15? That seems fair. And, yes, ST members don't usually read every single message that gets to them, so this could be a flaw, however if a separate page is set up dedicated to checkpoints that could be fine.

Other than that, this suggestion is entirely possible

In my opinion, this just puts needless stress on the ST.

Almost all suggestions that are in the Suggestions forum will never be implemented. The ST already knows the rough idea of what they want, and they mainly look for feedback on the smaller functions of it. They aren't really going for brand new ideas very much. I assure you they have people who read the Suggestions forum, but they are certainly not looking around to approve suggestions.

When they find a suggestion they like, it goes through many people, design teams, and more. It takes months or even years just to announce it to the public, if they even do that at all.

So, I think this suggestion would encourage needless spam on ST members, and I doubt it would ever be used with the exception of on rejected suggestions.

I don't understand why this change needs to happen. It feels complex and doesn't really achieve much, sure it could streamline the suggestion process but could put more pressure on the Scratch Team as the previous commenters have said. I really think this is just redundancy, as it seems like an overcomplicated system without much reason to implement it, and which can pretty much be achieved using what is available right now.

To clarify my point: this checkpoint system would just be a method to poke the Scratch team to comment on your suggestion which can already happen but what it will do is put the burden on them to reply to it and countless suggestions to clarify rather then choosing what are the most important suggestions to respond to. This will put a bureaucratic system over something simple, and it doesn't have many implementation details like can a ST member ignore this? (I would assume no from the context but this would put a significant burden otherwise.) And if so, what would be the point? Why couldn't we just write a normal comment? Would this comment be highlighted in some way or be special?

At the current moment I can just not agree with this suggestion as it is simply unnecessary and therefore I oppose its implementation.