Y390 Undergraduate Independent Study (1-3 cr.) P: instructor's permission. Independent research based on existing literature or original work. A report, in the style of a departmental technical report, is required. May be repeated but credit not given for more than 6 credit hours of any combination of Y390, Y391, Y398, Y399, Y499, C390, and C391.
Y391 Undergraduate Independent System Development (1-3 cr.) P: instructor's permission. The student designs, programs, verifies, and documents a project assignment. Prior to enrolling, the student must arrange for an instructor to supervise the course activity. May be repeated but credit not given for more than 6 credit hours of any combination of Y390, Y391, Y398, Y399, Y499, C390, and C391.
Y499 Honors Research (1-12 cr.) P: approval of departmental honors committee. Credit not given for more than 6 credit hours of Y390, Y391, Y398, Y399, Y499, C390, and C391. I Sem., II Sem., SS.
These courses require a faculty supervisor. The prerequisite "instructor's permission" refers to this supervisor's permission, not permission of the Director of Undergraduate Studies (who is the instructor of record in the schedule of classes).
The primary motivation for taking an independent effort course should be the student's desire to do independent work. The motivation should never be the absence of other means of satisfying graduation requirements on a desired time schedule.
Independent effort courses do not normally satisfy project (P) or area distribution requirements, but this is sometimes approved by petition to the director of undergraduate studies (email DUGS@cs.indiana.edu). Project distribution may be appropriate for Y391, but area distribution is approved only in highly exceptional cases.
It is the student's responsibility to find a faculty supervisor. Some faculty may have projects to suggest, but most expect students to approach them with a clear project idea. Faculty are under no obligation to supervise independent study courses. They do so only when they are sufficiently interested in the proposed topic, have confidence in the student's ability and motivation to work independently, and are prepared to spend whatever time they feel will be required to satisfactorily supervise and evaluate the project. This may mean among other things that they expect the student to have performed well in a related course they have taught.
If the faculty sponsor is not a member of the computer science department, registration requires approval of the computer science department's director of undergraduate studies. In that event, email DUGS@cs.indiana.edu with a description of the project and identify the faculty sponsor.
In every case the student and faculty sponsor must agree on a number of credit hours for the course registration that is within the range specified in the catalog description. The university expects about 50 hours of effort for each registered credit hour.
In the case of Y499, the student shall prepare a project description (two or three page) for review by the project supervisor. The project description, with the supervisor's signature, shall be sent to the departmental honors program director for review.
After completing the above steps, registration authorization may be obtained by:
It is important that before registration the student and supervisor be in clear agreement about expectations for completion of the project. This includes project deliverables, the date for submission of the final project and any intermediate milestones, and the timing of supervision meetings. Deliverables always include a written project report.
Revised 6/3/02 by Chris Haynes