CSCE 488: Professional Development
Syllabus, Spring 2010
(Adopted from the CSCE 488 Syllabus of previous semesters)
|
Instrutor:
Hong Jiang
jiang@cse.unl.edu
472-6747
Office: 103 Schorr Center,
Hours: 2:00-3:00 PM, MW (Contact me to setup appointments at other times, if
this does not work for you)
TA: Yutaka Tsutano,
104 Avery Hall
Email: ytsutano-at-cse.unl.edu
Office Hours and location: 2:30-3:30PM,
Wednesdays, at the Student Resource Center, Avery Hall
Pre- and Post-requisites: : JGEN 200; ELEC 362, 476 and CSCE 430; Must be taken
exactly one semester before CSCE-489.
Prerequisites
by Topic:
Familiarity with: professional writing & speaking styles (in a general
context), conventional word-processors, computer organization, logic design,
and computer programming.
Exposure to: the concepts and principles of professional ethics and team
dynamics.
Course Goals:
The 488-489 course sequence is unique among your undergraduate
courses in aiming to prepare you for the professional life after graduation.
For a successful engineering career, technical knowledge is certainly necessary
but not sufficient. Proficiency in technical communication, ability to work in
a team, and awareness of professional ethics are just as important. All of
these elements are brought together in the 488-89 course sequence under the
guise of a team project that you conceive, develop in sufficient detail to
demonstrate its feasibility, and report on it both in writing and orally.
·
Reading
Comprehension. Read and critique technical material effectively,
·
Project
Design. Work in teams to brainstorm on ideas for a substantial team project
that you might carry out in 489.
·
Writing
and Oral Communication. Report on your project proposal both in writing and in
oral presentations according to professional norms
·
Design
Implementation. Realize and report on a component of your proposed project
according to a well-defined schedule.
Required Text:
Inviting Disasters: Lessons
from the Edge of Technology by James R. Chiles,
Collins; Reprint edition (September 1, 2002), ISBN: 0066620821. (Link to
the book on Amazon.com
and at the publisher's
website)
Electronic
Communication:
Class web page:
http://cse.unl.edu/~jiang/cse488/
Class email list: csce488 (to be confirmed)
Your email address for the class list is derived from UNL Blackboard. You
should have received an email from me before the beginning of the class. If you
did not receive the email or will like us to use a different alias, send a
message to the Lab TA, Yutaka Tsutano, asap. Instruction for online handin will be sent to you later.
Class Schedule:
8:30-9:20 M.W. (except for Week 1 of the semester with a Friday class on
January 15). We will follow this schedule for
about one third of the course and thereafter meet at the scheduled time on an
as-needed basis. Always check the class web page for announcements before you
come to the class. For the rest of the semester, weekly team meetings with the
instructor and TA, to be scheduled individually for each team, will be conducted
in lien of the scheduled classroom meetings.
Attendance Policy:
We expect you to attend classes regularly and
participate in class discussion. If you must miss a class for some unavoidable
reason, we would appreciate knowing ahead of time.
Grading:
There are no tests in this course. Your grade
for the course will involve team work (80%) and individual work (20%). There
will be four team assignments and two individual assignments, requiring
activities typically engaged in by professional engineers: technical research,
critical summary of technical material, weighing in professional behavior
according to ethical standards, and most importantly, work related to a
project, including refining specifications to meet project requirements,
managing team work, and successful completion on schedule. The relative weights
of the six assignments will be as follows:
|
1. (Individual) Written report on technical research |
10% |
|
2. (Team) Reading comprehension, oral presentation, and leading technical discussion (based on the textbook) |
15% |
|
3. (Team) Oral critique of old project reports |
10% |
|
4. (Team) Written preproposal for the project |
25% |
|
5. (Individual) Classroom participation in discussion on professional ethics, etc. (Your attendance is a part of this) |
10% |
|
6. (Team) Oral presentation of the project preproposal and miniproject implementation |
30% |
Final grades will be assigned based on the following cutoff percentages:
|
A+ |
A |
A- |
B+ |
B |
B- |
C+ |
C |
C- |
D |
F |
|
97 |
93 |
90 |
87 |
83 |
80 |
77 |
73 |
70 |
60 |
<60 |
Tentative Schedule: Refer to the class web page.
Last updated: January 10, 2010