4:00-6:30 Wed 205 Hitchcock |
Dr. David Reed
203D Hitchcock x2583 DaveReed@creighton.edu |
Texts: | Blown to Bits: Your Life, Liberty, and Happiness After the Digital Explosion. Hal Abelson, Ken Ledeen, and Hary Lewis, Addison-Wesley, 2008. The Information: A History, A Theory, A Flood. James Gleick, Vintage, 2012. |
Prerequisite: Computer Science & Informatics major, Senior standing
This project-based capstone is intended for computer science seniors. Students will meet weekly to discuss seminal papers and issues in computer science, many of which will focus on the ethical and professional responsibilities of computer scientists. In addition, each student will design, implement, and present a project that integrates computer science content from his or her major courses. It is expected that the project will involve building a software and/or Web-based product, such as database of resources for a non-profit organization, a mobile app for locating classrooms on campus, or an interactive, multimedia Web site for a student group.
Specific objectives:
This course meets the Magis Core requirements for Designated Ethics and Designated Oral Communication. As such, it has the following additional goals:
The class will meet weekly to discuss current and historical papers in computer science. Each student will lead one or more of the discussion sessions and present summaries of the paper to the class. Many of these papers will focus on ethical issues in computer science, and the responsibilities of computing professionals.
Each student will complete a 5-10 page midterm paper on the ethical issues related to a real-world situation. This will involve researching different viewpoints, taking a position, and justifying that position using data and supporting arguments. An example topic might be the case of Edward Snowden, exploring whether his actions were ethical and justified.
In addition, students will work in teams of two or three to design, develop, and present a software project. The project must integrate content from the computer science curriculum. For example, developing a mobile application that connects to a customer database would integrate concepts from Data Structures, Web Programming, and Databases.
The final grade for the course will be based on the following weightings:
Seminar-style discussions
attendance/participation (20%)
preparation/leading (10%)
30% Midterm paper 25% Capstone Project
project proposal (5%)
midway checkpoint (5%)
deliverables (20%)
practice presentation (5%)
presentation (10%)
45%
At the minimum, departmental grading cutoffs for the final average will apply. That is, 92-100% guarantees an A, 87-91% a B+, 82-86% a B, 77-81% a C+, 71-76% a C, and 60-70% a D. Depending on class performance, some shifting of grades (in an upward direction only) may occur as final letter grades are assigned.
Students are expected to attend each class meeting and contribute to discussions. Absences will adversely affect the student's discussion grade.
It is expected that all students check their Creighton email accounts regularly. Official announcements, such as assignment revisions or class cancellations, will be distributed through Creighton email.
Creighton's policy on cheating and plagiarism is spelled out in the Student Handbook, with college procedures available online. In addition, the Capstone project must be an original work of the student or team of students for this course. When the project builds upon existing ideas or code, the sources must be appropriately referenced.
Date | Discussion | Project |
---|---|---|
Aug 22 | Organizational meeting | |
29 | Blown to Bits, Ch. 2 (Reed) Blown to Bits, Ch. 3 (Reed) |
|
Sep 5 | Blown to Bits, Ch. 4 (Johnson) Blown to Bits, Ch. 5 (Dougherty) |
Project team roster due |
12 | Blown to Bits, Ch. 6 (Labausa) Ethical Concepts and Information Technology, Laudon (Reed) Programmers need ethics when designing the technologies that influence people's lives, Pancake (Reed) |
Project proposal due |
19 | Computing Machinery and Intelligence, Turing (Reed) Movie Night |
|
26 | Professionalism & career planning Resume & Interview Tips from the Career Center Paper & project consultations |
Midterm paper notes due |
Oct 3 | As We May Think, Bush (Tsuzaki) Automatic Programming for Digital Computers Hopper (Reed) Project consultations |
|
10 | A design methodology for reliable software systems, Liskov (Yu) The Mythical Man-Month, Brooks (Hecke) Project consultations |
Midterm paper due |
17 | FALL BREAK - NO CLASS | |
24 | The World Wide Web, Berners-Lee, Cailliau, Luotonen, Nielsen & Secret (Lee) The Anatomy of a Large-scale Hypertextual Web Search Engine, Brin & Page (Theis) |
|
31 | The Information: Ch 1 (Lo) The Information: Ch 2 (Bell) |
|
Nov 7 | Project progress critiques | Project checkpoint |
14 | The Information: Ch 3 (Smith) The Information: Ch 4 (Mills) |
|
21 | THANKSGIVING BREAK - NO CLASS | |
28 | The Information: Ch 5 (Reed) The Information: Ch 6 (Reed) |
|
Dec 5 | A Mathematical Theory of Communication, Shannon (Reed) | Project due Practice presentations |
12 | Project presentations |