COMP8400 - Assessment Scheme for 2013

• The total workload for this (6 units) course is around 156 hours (around 12 hours per semester week).
• The mark reported for a student will reflect that student's performance in the course and will be based on the assessment scheme given below.

For semester 1 2013, the following assessment is proposed:

1. Assignments
   • There will be two assignments, each worth 18% of the final course mark (each marked out of 18).
   • These assignments will take the form of a short essay, programming task, or small data mining project.
2. Presentation
   • Students will give a short presentation of a research paper of their choice (from a selected range of publications from recent conferences) in the last couple of weeks of the semester.
   • This presentation (including a short report about the presented paper and the slides used in the presentation) is worth 14% of the final course mark.
3. Final written examination
   • This will be a 3 hour written exam held at the end of the semester during the normal examination period.
   • This exam is worth 50% of the final course mark.

Please note

• Any changes to the assessment scheme will be announced and discussed in lectures and posted to this Web page.
• If there are no changes to the proposed scheme by the end of semester week 2 (Friday 1 March 2013), it will be the scheme that will be used.

Final course mark

• To pass this course you must score at least 50 out of a 100 marks.
• A supplementary exam will be offered only to those students who have a final mark of at least 45 out of 100, but less than 50 out of 100 (see below for more details).
• Note that final marks are moderated in examiners' meetings and may be scaled as a result of this moderation.

Extensions and late penalties for assignments

In general, there will be no extensions for assignments, the exception being for illness serious enough to keep you in bed, supported by a medical certificate. Other similarly un-foreseeable and serious circumstances may be considered (if similarly verified). Work and sporting commitments are not normally sufficient grounds. If you think you have grounds for an extension, you should notify the course coordinator as soon as possible, and provide written evidence in support of your case (such as a medical certificate). The course coordinator will then decide whether to grant an extension and inform you as soon as practicable.

Without an explicit extension from the course coordinator, late assignments will be penalised at the rate specified on the assignment documents.

Plagiarism and assisting plagiarism in assignments

• No group work is permitted for any part of the assessment. We do encourage you to discuss your work in the labs and lectures, but we expect you to do the submitable work by yourself.
• We do take plagiarism seriously! Please make sure you read the following pages:
  http://cs.anu.edu.au/study/currentstudents/assessmentissues
  http://academichonesty.anu.edu.au/anu_policy_for_academic_honesty.html
  

Files you have found on the Internet should not be submitted as your work; but your documents may include URL links to external documents. You should avoid copying or closely paraphrasing material from documents that you find, including those of your friends (it's plagiarism) or textbooks. If you feel it necessary to include material from some other document, then it should be clearly identified as such, identifiable as quoted material by layout or quotation marks, and proper attribution made. Be aware that automated tools to detect plagiarism exist and might be used (for example Glatt).

All assignment submissions will be compared by the course coordinator, with any that are suspiciously similar being investigated. If such similarities cannot be satisfactorily explained, appropriate action (see the penalties mentioned in the handbook) will be taken. Note that the action of providing access to another student to an assignment may result in the offense of assisting plagiarism, and similar penalties (i.e. partial or complete loss of marks) may apply. Don't take such risks!

Access to your marks, collecting marked work and remark policy

• Marks will be made available on the COMP8400 Wattle Web site.

• If you have problem with this please contact the course coordinator.

• Marked assessment will be returned in the labs/tutorials, generally two weeks after the submission deadline. If you are unhappy about the marking of an assignment, discuss it with the course coordinator.

• Uncollected assessment will be kept by the course coordinator until the end of semester, after which uncollected work may be collected from a yet-to-be-specified place in the CSIT Building.

From the date that your assignment marks are released electronically, you have a period of two weeks in which to question your mark. After this period your mark will be final. Release of your assignment marks will be announced on the course Web site and in the lectures.

Special consideration and special / supplementary exams

If you are feeling unwell on the day of an examination, you can consider taking the exam and then applying for Special Consideration. Note that it normally takes fairly severe symptoms before your performance will be significantly affected (and that only for a sufficiently serious condition will a Special Examination be granted, should you decide not to take the exam then).

Supplementary exams will be awarded to all students who receive a PX grade (i.e. have a final mark of at least 45/100 but less than 50/100), and only to those students. Students who receive a PX grade will be notified by the SoCS Office of the time and place of the Supplementary Exam as soon as that is decided (likely to be the 1st week of semester 2) - ignore any messages from ISIS that you need to contact the lecturer first. The supplementary exam will have the same format and same conditions as the main exam.