Computer Science Group Project COMP3130

Course overview

Course description

This course provides the students with research experience. It exposes the students to team work, problem solving skills, research skills and project management. Students will work in small groups on a synergistic project that covers at least two of the areas in computer science, such as the following: Applications, Programming Languages and Systems and Theory. This will promote depth of study in at least two different areas of computer science for the students.

Course content

The course comprises a single research problem which is presented to the students and solved in groups.   The research problem is a real problem formulated by a researcher for this course.  The challenge for the students is to attempt a solution to this problem and effectively communication the outcome.  A key component of the course is weekly meeting between each group and the academic who has posed the problem.   Students thus get first-hand experience in addressing a real-world research problem with hands-on guidance from a researcher.  The nature of the research problem will typically tap into a range of material that the students will have been exposed to in their computer science program.

Rationale

Research in the real world is rarely conducted by individuals in isolation; most research is conducted by collaborative teams of researchers.   Research depends on a wide range of skills that go well beyond mastery of the subject matter.  Communication is an essential part of research.  This course exposes students to real research, challenges them to work as a group to solve a problem, challenges them to effectively utilize the resources made available to them (equipment and human expertise) and requires students to effectively communicate their findings.

Topics

The broad topic of this course is computer science research.   The specific research question/s posed in a given semester dictate the particular areas of computer science that the students will address.

Technical skills

The course draws on a wide range of technical skills, which varies depending on the particular research problem posed.  Generally research problems will require students to study a specific area of computer science in more detail than they have learned in their coursework to date.  One of the challenges that this course poses is for each group to effectively draw on their collective skill sets (including programming, problem solving, communication skills, and their ability to research a subject) to solve the problem.

Workload

As many hours as necessary for meetings with supervisors and a nominal 10 hours per week