Organization

This course consists of lectures, reading and reviewing research papers, and a final project.

Grading

• Paper review: 5%
• Paper presentation: 25%
  • lead the discussion of a paper from the reading list.
• Programming assignments: 30%
  • 2 assignments
• Final Project: 40%
  • 1-page project proposal: 10%
  • Project presentation: 10%
  • Final code & report: 20%

Assignment late penalties

We are flexible about submitting assignments late. Unless otherwise specified, assignments may be turned in late with the following penalties applied to the score received. Homework and programming assignments will be accepted up to 4 days late, but at a penalty. The penalty is 5% for one day late, 15% for two days late, 30% for 3 days late, and 50% for 4 days late.

Late penalties may be avoided or reduced by obtaining an extension on the assignment. However, any extensions must be approved by the instructor at least two days before the due date—last-minute extensions will not be granted except in exceptional circumstances. Extension requests should be made via email; copying all group members on the request. They should include a description of why an extension is being requested.

Final Project

The goal of the project is to gain an in-depth understanding of the techniques presented in the course by re-implementing them, applying them to a new domain, or extending them. A list of possible project topics is available here. You can also suggest your own project, pending instructor approval. If you are already working on a research project that fits the theme of this course, feel free to use this as your final project (but please let us know).

Projects are expected to be done in teams of one or two. The scope of the project should be commensurate with the size of the team and whether this is a cross-project for multiple courses.

There will be three milestones throughout the quarter:

• The first milestone is a project proposal where you explain what you plan to do and why you think it’s a good idea. You should elaborate on the following: what are you proposing to do, why is it interesting or important, what are the expected challenges, how does it relate to the state of the art, what evidence do you have so far to suggest this may work. It is expected that for this milestone you will have already done some work towards the project, so we encourage you to come talk to us about your project ideas a couple of weeks before the second milestone.
• The second milestone is a short presentation describing your project; the exact length of the presentations will depend on the number of projects that are submitted.
• At the end of the quarter, you are expected to submit a final report describing your project. The report should be 3-8 pages in length in any format (e.g. like this). The report should read like a short paper, so it should make it clear what you did, why you did it, and what you learned from doing it.

Overall, projects will be judged in terms of quality of execution, originality and scope.