CS 5244 - Digital Libraries

(Updated Sat May 29 14:03:05 GMT-8 2004 )

Lectures, class participation will be used for the first half of the course. The first half will cover fundamentals of information retrieval and digital library standards, as well as furnish the students with a wide variety of topics of current interests to information professions in academic and industry.

A midterm and a final, accounting for 30% of the grade will assess the students' knowledge of the breadth of the material covered in the course.

Survey paper. By the midpoint of the course, students will have selected one topic (from a controlled list) to write up a survey paper on, using papers suggested by the lecturer and through their own information gathering.

Project. Once the survey has been handed in self-organized into small groups and selected a particular project for further study. The groups will propose projects to lecturer for final evaluation and demonstration to the public through a poster presentation at the end of the semester. Grading for the project is based on what you might experience from a conference reviewer. A grading rubric for a past incarnation of the class is available to help you get a feel for the criteria.

The grading for this class will comprise of the following continuous assessment milestones and a final exam.

Description	Percentage
Midterm	10%
Survey Paper	15%
Project Write-Up and Deliverables	40%
Project Presentation	10%
Final Exam	20%
Total	95%

Although attendance is not required, participation is. Participation will account for the remaining 5% of your grade. In-class and out of class participation are equally weighted; if you prefer to contribute to the class discussion offline (in the forum) rather than online, that is fine as well.

Participation is very helpful for your teaching staff too. Without it, we have very little idea whether you understand the material that we've presented or whether it's too difficult or trivial. Giving feedback in the form of questions, discussion provides us with a better idea of what topics you enjoy and which you are not too keen on.

Your teaching staff will try their best to provide you with detailed assessment marks within three weeks of the submission due date. You are welcome to debate/argue for any extra points that you feel that you deserve within one week after the initial grades have been released. Due to time constraints on finalizing grades, grade appeals beyond this time may or may not be entertained.

Academic Honesty Policy

Collaboration is a very good thing. Students are encouraged to work together and to teach each other. The extra-credit programming homework will require a team effort in which everyone is expected to contribute.

On the other hand, cheating is considered a very serious offense. Please don't do it! Concern about cheating creates an unpleasant environment for everyone.

So how do you draw the line between collaboration and cheating? Here's a reasonable set of ground-rules. Failure to understand and follow these rules will constitute cheating, and will be dealt with as per University guidelines. We will be policing the policy vigorously.

You should already be familiar with the University's academic code. If you haven't yet, read it now.

The Gilligan's Island Rule: This rule says that you are free to meet with fellow students(s) and discuss assignments with them. Writing on a board or shared piece of paper is acceptable during the meeting; however, you may not take any written (electronic or otherwise) record away from the meeting. This applies when the assignment is supposed to be an individual effort. After the meeting, engage in a half hour of mind-numbing activity (like watching an episode of Gilligan's Island -- an old American T.V. show, just in case you haven't heard of it), before starting to work on the assignment. This will assure that you are able to reconstruct what you learned from the meeting, by yourself, using your own brain.
The Freedom of Information Rule: To assure that all collaboration is on the level, you must always write the name(s) of your collaborators on your assignment. Failure to adequately acknowledge your contributors is at best a lapse of professional etiquette, and at worst it is plagiarism. Plagiarism is a form of cheating.
The No-Sponge Rule: In intra-team collaboration where the group, as a whole, produces a single "product", each member of the team must actively contribute. Members of the group have the responsibility (1) to not tolerate anyone who is putting forth no effort (being a sponge) and (2) to not let anyone who is making a good faith effort "fall through a crack" (to help weaker team members come up to speed so they can contribute). We want to know about dysfunctional group situations as early as possible. To encourage everyone to participate fully, we make sure that every student is given an opportunity to explain and justify their group's approach.

Late Submissions

All assignments are due to IVLE by 11:59:59 pm (Singapore time) on the due date. These penalties are very strict, so plan to finish on time. Excuses will not be tolerated, and no exceptions without a medical certificate will be made. The following penalties will apply for late submissions:

late within 10 minutes: 5% reduction in grade;
late within 1 hour: 10% reduction in grade;
late within 24 hours: 30% reduction in grade;
late within 3 days: 50% reduction in grade;
late within a week: 70% reduction in grade;
after one week: zero mark.

Min-Yen Kan <kanmy@comp.nus.edu.sg> Created on: Sat May 29 14:02:14 GMT-8 2004 | Version: 1.0 | Last modified: Fri Sep 24 12:16:49 2004

CS 5244 - Digital Libraries

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Academic Honesty Policy

Late Submissions