Instructor: Dr. Johnnie W. Baker
Credit hours: 1-2, repeat enrollment allowed
Prerequisites: admission to graduate program
Meeting Time: MWF 3:45-5:00pm, at scheduled meetings
This course serves a dual role. First and foremost, it is a forum to foster a research culture in the department and discuss the theoretical and practical issues of conducting research and completing a graduate degree in Computer Science. As such, all Computer Science graduate students are welcome and encouraged to attend the scheduled lectures, presentations, and colloquium.
Second, this course is a graduation requirement for all Masters and Doctoral students. For that purpose, the goal is to learn the practical skills of giving a presentation and writing a research paper.
The course is organized as a series of lectures on giving presentations, writing papers, and other aspects of performing research and pursuing a graduate degree, along with a set of invited research talks and colloquia (including those in the departmental Colloquium Series). Additionally, most students in the class will be giving presentations on their current work as described below.
Masters students are required to take at least two credit hours of Seminar for the completion of their degree, and to make at least one presentation of project work or research. Doctoral students are required to take at least three credit hours of Seminar for the completion of their degree, and to make at least two presentations of project work or research.
The presentation(s) must take place in the Seminar at least one term before graduation. A student's Thesis / Dissertation Defense or other local presentation can NOT be counted to fulfill this degree requirement.
This course may be taken multiple times, but only three credit hours count toward the Doctoral degree, and only two credits count toward the Masters degree. Students who have already taken sufficient hours of Seminar to meet their degree requirement can choose the S/U grading option in subsequent semesters (see below).
There are two grading options for this course:
Students registered for either the Masters or Doctoral Seminar MUST attend all scheduled lectures and events. Lectures will likely include such topics as presentation skills, CS publishing venues, and writing CS research papers, along with some invited research talks and colloquia (including those in the departmental Colloquium Series.
The class schedule is posted on the class web page and will be regularly updated. It is the student's responsibility to keep track of the event schedule, to attend the classes, and to sign in as evidence of attendance at each class. Students with an excused absence (e.g., a documented illness) must notify the instructor as soon as possible. Students with three or four unexcused absences will receive one letter grade penalty. Five or more unexcused absences will result in an F or U grade for the course. Signing in for a student who is absent will be considered Academic Dishonesty and is grounds for failing the course.
Both Masters and Doctoral programs have a degree requirement to complete a presentation(s) at least one term before graduation. A Thesis Defense, Candidacy presentation, Dissertation Defense, or other local presentation can NOT be counted as one of the presentations -- these presentation must take place during the Masters/Doctoral Seminar.
All students taking the course for a letter grade must make at least one presentation during the term. A brief proposal which is appropriate for posting on our website and which describe the content of the presentation is due to the Seminar instructor at least one week before the date of the talk. Students who have taken the Seminar for a grade in previous semesters must contact the course instructor by the end of the first week of classes; students who contact the course instructor later are unlikely to be accomodated.
The presentation should be a talk on your current research, accessible to a general audience of CS graduate students. The talk may describe work you are conducting for your thesis/dissertation, investigations with your advisor, recent publications you have been involved with, or a summary of related work with respect to your research area/topic. Talks will be scheduled into a 20 minute time slot, with 15 minutes for the talk and 5 minutes for questions. Grading will be based on the presentation's content and presentation style. A lecture on how to give a good presentation will be given early in the term.
For presentations to be counted towards the degree requirement the students must download and fill out the Master/Doctoral Seminar Presentation Form. This form must be submitted to the Seminar instructor at the time of the talk, along with the abstract and a copy of the presentation slides.
All students taking the course for a letter grade must write a research short paper (4-5 pages in ACM SIG Conferences Proceedings format, MINUS the "Categories and Subject Descriptors" and the "General Terms". Follow all of the other formatting guidelines and examples in that format. All papers MUST be in the required format, including font sizes and formats for citations and references.
The paper should be accessible to a general audience of CS graduate students (i.e, not just students in that research area), and should summarize the current research you are conducting towards your thesis, or 2-3 research papers of interest to you (NOT a single paper). A lecture on the organization of research papers will be given early in the term. Note the materials on the class web page about citing references, organizing a paper, and paraphrasing to avoid plagiarism.
A first draft of the paper is due to the Seminar instructor electronically in .doc, .docx, or .pdf format by 5pm on Monday November 29, 2010. The final version is due electronically by 5pm on Wednesday December 8, 2010.
Student-teacher relationships are built on trust. Students must trust that educators have made appropriate decisions about the structure and content of the courses they teach, and educators must trust that the assignments which students turn in are their own. Acts that violate this trust undermine the educational process. In this course, the penalty for any act of academic dishonesty is a final course grade of F.
All students taking the course should read:
University Policy 3342-3-01.3 requires that students with disabilities be provided reasonable accommodations to ensure their equal access to course content. If you have a documented disability and require accommodations, please contact the instructor at the beginning of the semester to make arrangements for necessary classroom adjustments. Please note, you must first verify your eligibility for these through Student Accessibility Services (contact 330-672-3391 or visit http://www.kent.edu/sas for more information on registration procedures).
The official deadline to register for this course is September 12, 2010 and to withdraw from this course is November 7, 2010. These deadlines may be confirmed at https://keys.kent.edu:44220/ePROD/bwlkffcs.P_AdvUnsecureCrseSearch?term_in=201080 . Each student must their confirm enrollment by checking his/her class schedule (using Student Tools in FlashLine) prior to the deadline indicated. Registration errors must be corrected prior to the deadline