coursework at georgia tech

Spring 2009 (current)

Creativity and Design Cognition (CS 8803), Professor Ellen Do

The seminar will engage in readings and discussions about the nature and studies of creativity and design cognition, ranging from the literature of design thinking and methods, representations and theories on design, models and computational support for creativity, and design process or collaboration.

Sensation and Perception (PSYC 6014), Professor Bruce Walker

We will examine how humans (and in some cases, other animals) sense and perceive the world around us. First we will consider the philosophical questions that humans have long posed about perception, and study the methods and techniques scientists use to try to answer them. We will study the sensory pathways, fundamental perceptual processing, and higher-level meaning-making. We will start with the perception of time, followed by audition, vision, the orienting senses, skin senses, and chemical senses. We will consider sensation and perception from several perspectives: physiological, psychophysical, ecological, motivational, and computational. This diversity of viewpoints also allows us to look at multi-sensory perceptual processes.

Fall 2008

Visual Culture and Design (LCC 6311), Professor Carl DiSalvo

Through a series of design assignments, readings and discussions, we jointly developed aesthetic skills and critical perspectives on how visual representations and expressions in digital media embody and interpret societal beliefs, customs and practices, and suggest and guide courses of action. In parallel with the design assignments, there were substantive readings and discussions related to the weekly subjects and project themes. The readings drew from scholars in visual culture and design studies and the projects reviewed span historical and contemporary designers and artists in a variety of media.

Psychological Statistics (PSYCH 2020/8903), Professor Daniel Spieler

This course was designed to provide Psychology students with an introduction to principles of statistical analysis for behavioral research. There was a heavy emphasis on developing procedural knowledge for how to do statistics, not merely an orientation to statistical theory. We were exposed to methods for descriptive and inferential statistics, including both (1) the theory and practice of the analysis of variance (ANOVA) to analyze data from psychological experiments, and (2) use of correlation and regression techniques.

Mobile and Ubiquitous Computing (CS 7470), Professor Thad Starner

This was a project-based class that included the construction and testing of a functional prototype. For me and my group, this consisted of a gesture-controlled mp3 player with haptic feedback. Throughout the class, we were also assigned readings that investigated the infrastructure required to develop mobile and ubiquitous computing applications and established major research themes and experimental practices.

Spring 2008

Principles of Interactive Design (LCC 6313), Professor Janet Murray

The goal of this class will be to master a method of thinking about design of digital artifacts as a process of inventing, appropriating, expanding, and refining genre convention. The key concepts covered will be the medium, affordances of the medium, agency, information abstraction, and scripting the itneractor. The gained will be conceiving, proposing, presenting in person, and writing about innovative projects. Class will include three major interactive pieces to exercise and push the skills in XML, Flash, PHP, and SQL.

Qualitative Methods (CS 6455), Professor Beki Grinter

Class will introduce the disciplinary origins of many qualitative methods that came from anthropology and sociology. By learning about the questions that qualitative methods were originally designed to answer, we’ll learn about how they can best be applied to questions of computer science and system design. This will be followed by looking at various data gathering and analysis techniques that form the core of qualitative methods.

We will combine learning about methods through instruction with learning about methods through doing. Finally, we will compliment our theoretical and practical knowledge with an examination of contemporary qualitative empirical research in Computer Science.

Management of Technology (MGT 6772), Professor Robert Burgess

A theme of this course is the analysis of the challenges associated with managing a firm's resources (technology, work force, materials, information, knowledge) for long-term competitive advantage.

Particular emphasis is placed on planning under conditions including rapid technological innovation (in products and processes), international competition, and changing markets. We cover methods to design (plan), measure (assess), and improve (change) technological capabilities for manufacturing and service firms.

Fall 2007

Human Computer Interaction (PSY 6750), Professor Bruce Walker

This course taught me about the importance of the human-computer interface in the design and development of things people use. We touched on many of the perceptual, cognitive, and social characteristics of people, as well as methods for learning more about the people using our systems (analyzing the tasks they perform, the way they perform them, the way they think and feel about what they do, etc.). We covered methods of design, and ways to evaluate and improve a design. The course balanced perceptual/psychological and computer science elements. We worked on individual and group projects to learn about the various stages of an effective design process.

Engineering Psychology (PSY 7101), Professor Gregory Corso

This class presented engineering psychology as an integral component in the design and evaluation of human-machine systems. Applied problems and general methodological questions were examined throughout. A semester-long project allowed the application of the learned methods and deliverables through the evaluation and redesign of an existing system.

Research Design (PSY 6018), Professor Arthur Fisk

We looked at the basic principles and practices of empirical research in psychology, covering both experimental and correlational methods and designs.