Five elements will factor into your grade in this class.

1. Paper summaries
2. Presentations
3. Participation
4. Project
5. Final Exam

1. Paper summaries (due via private piazza messages, 10 minutes before class (no late summaries accepted) -- a paper summary is no more than 1 page long (no more than 2 pages total for all papers for a particular day), and contains the following information: 

1. Summary of the paper [in the neighborhood of 2-3 sentences, everything else about 1 sentence each]
2. What is the most important result?
3. One strength of the paper
4. One weakness of the paper
5. One thing you didn't understand
6. If you wrote this paper, what would your next paper be about?
7. (Don't overthink this -- if a question is inappropriate for the paper, skip it.)

2. Presentations. Each student will make a presentation of a particular topic to the class. Think of it as a mini research exam, where you become the expert on a topic, and lead discussion of a couple of papers. It is important that you not only establish yourself as an expert in the area, but also foster discussion among the class.

3. Participation. Each class will be a DISCUSSION of a particular set of papers. I expect each student to participate in, but not dominate, the conversations about the papers.

4. Projects -- more discussion of this on Piazza.

5. We will have a final exam. It will cover the papers you read during the quarter.

We will use Piazza in this class to keep track of the schedule, sign up for presentations, distribute information about assignments, and turn in paper summaries. Sign up for the class here, then after that you can access the class here