CSC 508 Course Requirements:

1. CLASS ATTENDANCE is CRITICAL to your grade. Participation and attendance are absolutely mandatory and contribute to your overall grade. I cannot stress this enough. Grades will reflect it... the class depends on it.

2. Formal Presentations - Students will make presentations on the weekly class topics. In the seminar style, the students will "teach" the class the given topics from the research literature. Presentations should be in lecture style with slides and a question / discussion period. The main focus of the discussions should be "what is important to know about this paper or topic and why?" Similarly, strengths and weaknesses of any approach given should be discussed. The student presenter should lead the discussion with the class. Do volunteer to review and present papers that interest you, this can help you research your paper topic. Please review this speaker's guide to assist you in your presentation. Even though it is a guide to presenting theoretical results, it applies quite well to the CSC 508 topics.

3. Research Paper - A publishable quality research paper will be produced for this class. It is expected that the topic will be a current topic of interest to software engineers and about 40 pages in length. A substantial bibliography is required. Your paper will be wholistically graded using the following paper standards. Note that several students in CSC 508 and 509 have had work accepted for publication by the International Association of Science and Technology for Development in their Software Engineering and Applications conference. A copy of preliminary versions of two sample papers are here - "Rethinking Software Process: The Key to Negligence Liability" and "The Modification Process: A Practical Means to Understand and Enhance the Software Requirements Engineering Process" are available for your review. These are condensed, worked over versions of longer research papers. Most of you, all of you, are capable of this sort of work and I encourage you to try (it's free...well, you do have to write the paper before you submit it! I believe I need say nothing about cheating or plagiarism in your work in this course, it is a serious matter and you are mature adults. Of course, I support collaboration and use of others' ideas in your own work, but they must (must!) be properly credited and your contribution or analysis noted.

4. Periodic presentations based on your research [progress] will be given to a) elicit feedback, and, b) give us the benefit of your progress. They should be short (about 10 minutes) and give an overview of a) your main interest (issue), b) the state of the art in that area, and, c) charts, graphs, realizations, comparisons, criticisms made in pursuit of progress towards your research paper. The first should be given at the 7th week and another during the 8th or 9th weeks.

5. Midterm exam - This exam will likely consist of a few essays regarding the readings we've been doing.  It will also likely require a bit of requirements analysis.      

5. Weekly review team - Each week three students are chosen at random to form a research evaluation committee for the class. These students are responsible to carefully follow the class presentations (take notes on lecture, Q&A) to synthesize and review the week's work for the class. The committee will convene for one week and will present its results on the Monday following the week of review. The presentation should be short, concise and highlight the important points of the previous week, noting strengths, weaknesses, insights and oversights for the class. What was worth learning and why? What should we ignore? Should anything be followed up further?


7. Optional: Journals: Lexicon - A lexicon will be kept with words and terms that require definition and thought. Students will keep the terms, notes about definitions and sources for information in a journal. The journals are expected to be kept current and will be randomly checked.  

 ______ Participation is required in all of the acitivities listed above.  You must take part in each and every activity in order to pass the course, even if you must do suboptimal work.