What is it? A semester long collaboration between a team of 4-6 Brandeis Students and a partner leading to the development of ideas, prototypes, market validations, or other mutually useful outcomes.
Is this only for Seniors? No. This semester it is open to all students who have taken Cosi 21a. As you can read elsewhere, the specific work you will be doing depends on the project. But what is always true is that you will need to be highly disciplined and focused.
What will we be doing? You will be working with a team of 4 or 5 other students. You will have the freedom to divide up the work whatever way the team decides. At the very start of the semester you will meet with your partner’s “Point of Contact” (POC) for a kick off meeting. You will have 2 weeks to plan your project, and determine the deliverables you want to commit to. Whatever structure will be provided primarily by you and your team members, the programming language, the literature that may be applicable, the papers, reports and memos you write, all of those will be determined by your team.
What is the schedule? This is a full semester course, 13 weeks. Once a week we will have a 1-2 hour meeting with your whole team and any other teams working with different partners. You will definitely have one or two meetings with your team (but without me) on a weekly basis and individual work. However you and your team will be fully responsible for all of that.
How much work is it? It depends on you. You should consider the workload from this to be more or less equivalent to any other higher level Computer Science course. A general rule of thumb is 10-15 hours per week but your mileage may vary
How do I sign up for it? You need to come to one of the two Field Project organizational meetings.
How many credits, if any? This is a 4 credit course.
How is it graded? You will get an A, B or C. No pluses or minuses. It is very simply based on two factors: (a) How well you and your team is self-organized, maintaining a steady momentum during the whole semester, focused on only the most important things. Do you make steady progress, is your team getting along, are you involving all team members, communicating and being productive? (b) How well you work with the partner, in terms of listening and hearing what they are looking for, impressing them with your professionalism, producing high quality deliverables, whether they be prototypes, designs, applications, research reports or anything else.