The goals for this course are for students to develop research skills for Computer Science, and to create a plan for completing their own MS project or thesis. Over the course of the quarter, students will work with their faculty advisor, the course instructor, and other students in the course to develop a preliminary research project or thesis proposal, known as a pre-proposal. Students will also set up a web page summarizing information on their project/thesis that will be provided as part of the announcement for their thesis/project defense. Each week students will discuss an assigned reading out of the course text, along with making a brief presentation and/or submitting a pre-proposal draft. Students will also create an annotated bibliography for their research topic over the quarter.

Schedule

1. Weeks 1-2: Getting started, identifying a research topic and possible advisor(s)
2. Weeks 3-6: Reading about the research topic and identifying a problem of interest
3. Weeks 7-10: Creating and revising drafts of the pre-proposal
   • Week 7: Submit first draft of pre-proposal, in-class peer-review
   • Week 8: Presentation of revised first draft
   • Week 9: Submit second draft of pre-proposal, in-class peer-review
   • Week 10: Submit final pre-proposal, present pre-proprosal in-class

In Weeks 2-9, depending on the week students will be required to read 1 or 2 research papers, and add them along with comments (roughly a paragraph long) to an annotated bibliography created using LaTeX/BibTeX. Students will submit their annotated bibliography as a .pdf file through myCourses, with an indication of which reference(s) were added.

Zobel, Justin. Writing for Computer Science, 2nd edition. London: Springer-Verlag, 2004 (available online through booksellers, and in the RIT bookstore).

Schedule of Readings

Completion of Pre-Proposal, and Registration for Project/Thesis

The pre-proposal is complete when the student's advisor emails the instructor to indicate that the pre-proposal is acceptable, sometime in Weeks 9-10 of the quarter. Students who do not have a pre-proposal accepted by a faculty advisor by the end of Week 10 will receive a grade of Incomplete (I), and need to register for the course again in the following quarter.

Once a student completes the seminar, they should register for the appropriate 0-credit project (4005-891-02) or thesis (4005-890-02) proposal course. Once a student has completed a proposal and had it accepted by their MS Committee (comprised of three faculty members, the Chair (advisor), Reader, and an Observer), the student may then register for the MS Project (4005-891-01) or Thesis (4005-890-01).

Grading

Pre-proposal (3 drafts)	30% (10% each)
Presentations (7)	38% (5 & 3/7% each)
Annotated Bibliography Updates (8 - Weeks 2-9)	24% (3% each)
Participation: Class Discussion for Readings	8%

All items (other than participation) are graded using a 4-point scale: M (missing - 0%), - (77%), + (88%) and ++ (100%). Presentations, annotated bibliographies and pre-proposals will be graded based on technical content, as well as clarity and style.

During the quarter, we will be completing two peer review exercises, in weeks 7 and 9. In these classes, students will exchange their proposals and provide feedback to one another using a reviewing form and through discussion. There is no grade associated with the peer reviews - however, many students find them to be very helpful.

Late Policy