Spring 2008 (current)

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.