BCS 152: Syllabus

Fall 2012

BCS 152 / LIN 217 / ASL 260 / PSY 152

Time & Location

Mondays & Wednesdays, 2:00 - 3:15 PM, Lower Strong Auditorium

Personnel

Instructor: T. Florian Jaeger

276-3611
Meliora Hall 418
Office Hours: by appointment

TA: Daniel Pontillo

585-771-7155
Lattimore 515
Office Hours: Mon 3:30-4:30 & Wed 11:30-12:30

TA: Samuel Corbin

530-355-1652
Lattimore 515
Office Hours: Tue 1-2 & Thu 3-4

Organization

There may be some overlap with other classes that you may have taken or intend to take. Given that BCS 152 is intended for students with a variety of backgrounds, I will have to ask you to bear with some redundancy now and then.

What will be covered? The exams and the assignments will cover material from the textbook, other assigned readings, and the slides from class. Class attendance is highly encouraged. In addition to any assigned readings, you are responsible for any and all material that is discussed during class. Lectures and readings overlap in many areas, but are not duplicates of each other. If you miss a class at any time, make sure to arrange for someone to take notes for you and advise you of any important announcements. It is critical to attend class on exam days. If you have a conflict please inform me one week prior to that day.

Readings, Class Participation, and Assessment

Your grade for this will be determined by four factors:

Three in-class exams: Exams will cover both lecture and reading contents. Anything in the readings or the lectures can be part of the exam. We will hand out practice questions one week before the exam. The exam will consist to at least 90% out of questions that are part of the practice questions.
- Exam 1 (25% of total score, plus up to 1% bonus points)
- Exam 2 (25% of total score, plus up to 1% bonus points)
- Exam 3 (15% of total score, plus up to 1% bonus points)
- Exams will assess your knowledge of both readings and lecture contents, although they will focus more on lectures. Exams are cumulative.
Reading assignments: There will not be a textbook this year, since the textbooks we have tried in the past weren't perceived to be particularly helpful. There are, however, readings for (almost) every class. These readings are obligatory. Please note that readings and classes are complementary. That is, the readings and the lecture overlap somewhat in topic, but not completely. Feel free to ask questions about the readings in class.
10 short assignments (homework) (35% total, plus up to a total of 3% bonus points for particularly clear and well-argued answers that go beyond being correct): We will use blackboard to post 1-2 short questions about the readings and lectures almost every week. Each answer will require about 1-3 paragraphs (no more than one page total for all answers).
- Assignments will be posted before Friday midnight. In the week before exams, we will not post assignments (to give you time to prepare for the exam). Please see the schedule for assignments.
- Assignments will contain questions about the readings for Monday and Wednesday and sometimes about the Monday lecture, but with a strong focus on the readings (lecture contents play a more important role for the exams; see above).
- You must submit your responses before Wednesday midnight.
- Make sure to put your student ID number, but not your name, on the top of the assignment.
Class participation and online discussion (up to 4% bonus points for regular and helpful class participation; this does include questions, comments, etc.). On BlackBoard, you will see a forum for each class meeting. You can post questions and comments about the readings in this forum, or you can upload helpful further readings (please provide full references in posts that you attach a paper to; when you provide links, state in the post what the link is to). Given the size of the class, we won't always be able to answer online, but we will read comments that are posted by 6pm before the day of the class.

Final grading will be based on relative performance and curved (i.e. your performance will be assessed relative to the class, guaranteeing that the overall difficulty of exams, homework assignments, etc. does not affect your grade).

The bonus points mentioned above provide a way to push you over a grade boundary (e.g. from a B to a B+ or a B+ to an A-, etc.). They are not enough to make up for missed exams or assignments.

Your Responsibilities

Attend class (make sure you have reliable notes for classes you miss).
Do the readings (it's the best way to make the most out of the class and to do the assignments).
Do the weekly assignments (submitting them gives you about 50/100 points for 35% of your grade; see below)!
Participate in the online discussion. You can earn extra points this way.
Prepare for the exams and come to the exams (we're handing out practice questions to make it easy for you).
Tell us early if there are problems (e.g. if you're feeling you're falling behind in class or if you're not understanding something). Make sure to not wait too long. Contact the teaching assistants and schedule a meeting with them. They will go over class content with you and provide general advice about the assignments. Please carefully read the policies posted below.
Read the announcements we sent out to the class. They may contain information about assignments and exams.

Learning Assistance

Students who require or desire assistance on how to take notes, study for exams, or write clearly should contact Learning Assistance Services (LAS) in Lattimore 107 (275-9049). If you would like to ask for learning assistance services for the homework assignments or exams, please contact the instructor within the first two weeks of the semester. You also need to inform the instructor of this class at least 5 business days in advance that you wish to take advantage of LAS for an exam. Thank you.

I urge you to come to me early in the semester. There is nothing that we can do later in the semester (every year a few students fail this class and it is almost always because they do not approach me about whatever personal and health challenges they are facing). I promise you that your concerns will be treated confidentially and in a sensible manner.

Academic Honesty

Don't cheat. Don't plagiarize. If you are unsure, please ask the teaching assistants for this class. You may discuss homework with fellow students, but write-ups must be completed independently. The use of books, notes, etc. during an exam is not permitted. On the exam day, bag, etc. must be left at the side of the room. Only writing material should be brought to the desk. Paper will be provided. More details can be found at http://www.rochester.edu/College/honesty/students.html. If you are caught cheating (which, unfortunately, has happened in the past), we will have to report you and you will receive 0% on the assignment or exam.

Scoring (Weekly Assignments and Discussion)

Scoring the assignments: Each week you will receive 5pts for submitting an answer to the questions we posted. We will also randomly select a subset of the answers to be graded by us. That subset of chosen answers can earn up to 12.5pts (plus bonus points for particularly nice answers). Over the course of the semester each student will be chosen four times (to guarantee fairness). Hence submitting the assignments will guarantee you 50% of the points you can reach from the assignments.

The randomly chosen answers will be posted to BlackBoard, where your fellow students will comment on them.

Discussion forum: We will be using a discussion forum for this class. Participation in this forum allows you to earn extra points that might decide between grades. There will be a folder for every lecture date that has an assigned reading. You can post questions, comments, or interesting follow-up material until 6pm the day before the class. For example, you might link to or upload a reading that is relevant to the class. We will especially reward attempts to answer other students’ questions. The TAs will moderate those answers and indicate whether they are right or wrong.

Be respectful to your fellow students and the TAs. Respect proper academic behavior. For example, if you upload an article or refer to, you must give the full reference in APA style and specifically slide 18 of http://flash1r.apa.org/apastyle/basics/index.htm).

Late Assignments Policies

Short homework assignments are due at Wednesday midnight. If you hand in homework assignments late, the following penalties apply:

Handed next day (-10% of max score for that assignment)
Handed in any later (-10% plus -10% of max score for number of days late; i.e. after 9 days, you really do not need to hand in anymore).

Exceptions: If you have arranged for an exception at least 3 days in advance and this exception has been granted, the above policies do not apply. Acceptable reasons include religious holidays and medical problems or arrangements via LAS (see above). If you have not arranged for an exception but were physically, emotionally, or metaphysically unable to attend the class at which the homework was due, we need proof (e.g. a letter from the health center).

Missed Exam Policies

There will be no make-up exams. If you miss an exam, you have earned 0% of the points.

Exceptions: If you have arranged for an exception at least 1 week in advance (we appreciate if you can let us know earlier) and this exception has been granted, the above policies do not apply. Acceptable reasons include religious holidays and medical problems or arrangements via LAS (see above). If you have not arranged for an exception but were physically, emotionally, or metaphysically unable to attend the class at which the homework was due, we need proof (e.g. a letter from the health center).

Exceptions to the Exceptions

There will be none. You can earn bonus points on some of the assignments and exams. Unfortunately, the class is too large to afford make-up exams, late homework grading beyond what is described above. Anything else would simply not be fair to the graders for this class.

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