Attendance

Attendance is expected in the course, and may be recorded in both lectures and labs. 10% of the course grade will be based on individual evaluation of assignments and class participation, and absences may negatively affect the grade. In addition, students might miss quizzes, which will not be made up without prior approval. Students with absences should notify the instructor ahead of time about any planned missed classes or labs. Unapproved absences may result in a lower course grade. It is particularly important to attend lab sessions, since this will often serve as a team meeting time for your project work.

Late Assignments

Each project will have a specified date and time at which it is due, and dates and times for which various intermediate parts of the project are due. Projects that are turned in late will have a penalty applied to the overall project grade, which will affect the grade given on that project for all team members (if individual reports are late, those will affect only the grade for that team member). The total number of minutes, m, that assignments within a project are late will be added up. The final grade on the project will be multiplied by 0.9998m. For example, if the project is 1 hour late, you lose a bit over 1%. If it is one day late, you lose about 25%. After 3 days, you are down to just 42% of your grade

Quizzes

The instructor may give out small quizzes in class, in lab, or online to ensure that students are continuing to follow course material. Any quizzes will be short and simple, related to recent course discussions or reading assignments. Quizzes will generally not be announced ahead of time. Quizzes will affect only the 10% "individual" grade portion on the class. Makeup quizzes will not be offered without prior approval, and in conjunction with Student rule 7.

Communication

Ecampus and Piazza will be used as websites for the class material. We will be using the piazza system for class discussions, and Ecampus for turnin. Students are responsible for checking both the ecampus page and piazza regularly for class updates, as well as paying attention to class emails

Code Documentation

A key part of this class is understanding the importance of clear code construction and documentation. Therefore, when assignments are graded, a significant portion of the grade may be based on an evaluation of how well the code is written, and how easy it is to follow. Just producing code that "works" is not sufficient; it will be your responsibility to produce code that the grader can follow. This includes both style of code writing as well as documentation of code.

Academic Honesty

The Aggie Honor Code is: "An Aggie does not lie, cheat, or steal or tolerate those who do." Upon accepting admission to Texas A & M University, a student immediately assumes a commitment to uphold the Honor Code, to accept responsibility for learning, and to follow the philosophy and rules of the Honor System. Students will be required to state their commitment on examinations, research papers, and other academic work. Ignorance of the rules does not exclude any member of the TAMU community from the requirements or the processes of the Honor System. For additional information please visit: http://aggiehonor.tamu.edu/

For this class, certain aspects of the honor code need to be clarified.

  1. There will be times in this course where you or your team make use of external code/software/libraries. Whenever this is done, you must make sure that you:
    • Follow any licensing and/or use restrictions that library/code requires
    • Clearly document what the source of the external code was, and how it was used
  2. There may be cases in this course where you or your team seeks outside assistance related to one of the projects. Any assistance received from people other than members of your team, the professor, teaching assistants, or peer teacher needs to be clearly documented.
  3. You will be working in team environments in this course, and your work as a team will be used to determine grades. As such, it is your responsibility, when asked, to:
    • accurately describe the work that you have done on a team project. Claiming credit for work that you have not done or that others did instead is a violation of the honor code.
    • accurately describe (to the best of your knowledge) the performance of other team members. "Covering" for another team member (claiming they did more work than you know they did, or exaggerating the work they did) or "spiking" them (claiming they did less work than you know they did, or purposefully minimizing the work they did) are examples of honor code violations.
    • prevent (as best you can) or report (known or suspected) violations of the honor code by your other team members. You share responsibility when a project is turned in; if you are aware of a teammate having violated the code in his/her work on the project, and do not report it, you are claiming credit for that violation yourself.

If there are any questions or concerns about whether an action is appropriate, you should check with the professor or teaching assistant first. If in doubt, assume that it is not appropriate.

ADA Statement

The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) is a federal anti-discrimination statute that provides comprehensive civil rights protection for persons with disabilities. Among other things, this legislation requires that all students with disabilities be guaranteed a learning environment that provides for reasonable accommodation of their disabilities. If you believe you have a disability requiring an accommodation, please contact Disability Services, currently located in the Disability Services building at the Student Services at White Creek complex on west campus or call 979-845-1637. For additional information, visit http://disability.tamu.edu.