The project is intended to provide a more developed sequence of understanding an application through direct experience. It provides an opportunity to demonstrate your learning of the exercise component of the course.
Projects should be done by a team to ease access to the computer and to share part of the work around. Teams can be more explicit in making decisions, while individuals might do something and justify it later. A team can consist of three to five students. The project is marked by a set of milestones to ensure that things operate smoothly. Projects that comply with these guidelines will receive timely feedback on their progress.
Good projects have a clear connection between the purpose and the analytical tools. The data are not as critical as the process you follow. A negative answer is fine, if you can show how you arrived at it. One quick way to get a project is to find an established procedure used to site a facility of some kind. There are lots of other models too. <see resources for project logic below>
Due on 3/4 November.
A project outline lists:
Shows how you have gone about following/amending your outline. Your data sources should be decided and your procedures laid out to reach your intended goals. Also should include a process flow diagram of your expected operations and transformations. This provides a final check on the feasibility of your project plan.
Not judged on number of pages or amount of spiffy color graphics, more on logic and your sense of humility in discovering the flaws in the data... At a minimum, it should revisit your original objective, and the actual objective attained. It should show the steps followed and draw some conclusions based on the materials produced. (Four sections?) Adopt a professional approach. If you write this for a potential employer, you could use this when you apply for jobs.
Each participant is responsible to write a distinct (individually signed) component investigating ONE of the data sources used in your project [See Discussion 3]. This section will identify the original source of your data, any intermediaries and transformations they may have performed, and the custodian from whom you obtained the data. (This can be considered a "chain of custody".) Consider questions such as the "mandate" of each organization, their level of resources available (budget, personnel, equipment), and the approach they took to measurement and representation. This should be a 1-2 page essay that will receive a weight of 5% on the total course grade.
Overall grading is described in Course Policies. Grades for projects will consist of five independent grades:
The first is a measure of how hard your problem is. You will get some credit for taking on a hard problem. If you start with a minimal problem, you will be warned in the review of your proposal. Often adding an extra analysis step will correct a project that seems unambitious. Larger groups are expected to take on proportionately more challenging topics.
Your technical solution will be graded on degree of excellence, in how the analytical procedure fits the problem. If your project consists of making a graphic display (no matter how pretty) and pointing at it, you will get a grade below 2.0. This is a course about GIS Analysis!
Your oral presentation will be graded on informativeness, succintness, degree of professional polish (PowerPoint is not mandatory, but it helps!). Teams that do not make an oral presentation (and individuals with an unexcused absence) will get a failing grade.
Your written report will be examined for documenting details not presented in the oral presentation. If it is just your PowerPoint slides, your grade will slide.
Team versus individual issues
In general, the grade assigned to the project will be assigned to each individual. TAs and the Instructor know which projects have a good team spirit, and which are failing. When some members do much more than their share, adjustments will be made. When some members of a group fail in their responsibilities, their individual grade may reflect this. Course management does not want to hear trivial issues you can solve amonst yourselves, but it does want to hear of any difficulties as early as possible. Learning how to make a successful team project is one of the course objectives.
Projects depend more on the logic you develop than the result you obtain.
Do not get hung up with trying to develop the perfect database, there is not enough time!
Of course, access to a diverse collection of source materials is crucial to smooth operation. There are many project data resources available in the Sherman Lab, and around campus.
A project works best when you have a set of external rules to start from. One simple way to proceed is to use the guidelines from some public agency (then modify them to suit your available data... of course).