Courses

Data is often considered the domain of scientists and statisticians, but its increasing
dominance across nearly all aspects of life – from political and advertising campaigns to social media, dating, education, and public health — has social, political, and ethical consequences, presenting both new possibilities and new hazards. In this course we think critically about how collecting, aggregating, and analyzing data affects individual and social life, with a focus on the ways in which it reproduces and creates new structural inequalities and power asymmetries.

Data is often considered the domain of scientists and statisticians, but its increasing dominance across nearly all aspects of life – from political and advertising campaigns to social media, dating, education, and public health — has social, political, and ethical consequences, presenting both new possibilities and new hazards. In this course we think critically about how collecting, aggregating, and analyzing data affects individual and social life, with a focus on the ways in which it reproduces and creates new structural inequalities and power asymmetries.

The course will cover how to identify and address specific student learning problems- as well as the closing of achievement gaps and planning for continuous school improvement. Students will learn a variety of methods to assess student achievement in science- both in the classroom and across a school.

This course explores the purposes of assessment in discipline areas, such as science, and developments in policy that have impacted assessment in schools. The course will cover how to identify and address specific student learning problems, as well as the closing of achievement gaps and planning for continuous school improvement.

Course focuses on the competencies required and the issues that arise Course focuses on how analysts use data and quantitative evidence to impact policy and practice. Students will learn how to gather and analyze data to address questions about program efficacy and efficient targeting of resources. Topics will include how to choose organizational partners, implement change, build trust with organizations and civic agencies, satisfy the needs of stakeholders and manage legal, ethical, and logistical constraints. Students will discuss real case studies and appropriate ways to address them.

The goal of this course is to learn how to effectively, honestly, and persuasively communicate about empirical research. Students develop competencies in writing, visualization, and oral presentation of technical material to both technical and lay audiences. Students learn practical strategies with ample opportunity to practice new skills. Assignments and discussion emphasize and explore the tension between concision and accuracy. Students receive feedback from the instructor, peers, and exemplars of intended audiences (e.g. employers who hire data scientists).

Not Available.

Increasingly, data is a primary factor in every step of the decision making process in education administration—from informing lines of inquiry to determining courses of action. In this course, students acquire the skills necessary to work with and analyze administrative and survey data and, in the process, describe school-related inputs, outcomes, relationships, and trends.

Data-centric technologies are transforming public policy, enabling new approaches for evaluating policies both retrospectively and prospectively; for detecting discriminatory practices; and for auditing and designing “fair” algorithmic systems. While current computational and statistical methods often promise increased efficiency, equity, and transparency, their use also raises complex legal, social,
and ethical questions. In this course, we will discuss such methods in a variety of applications, and will examine the relationships between law, policy, and data.

Explores early and obsolete media technologies. After an intensive introduction to the theory and methods of media archaeology, students will venture into local archives, libraries, and museums in search of texts, images, and sounds to be assembled into dossiers. Projects will be undertaken collaboratively, with regular reports and critiques throughout the semester.

Based on three pillars of experiential learning--exploration, collaboration, and engagement--this course introduces students to pathways of academic, personal and professional achievement. The course includes three main components: self-assessment, understanding mentorship, and understanding leadership. Students will conduct individual and group self-assessments and interest inventories; identify and cultivate mentoring relationships in their field of study; and examine and practice leadership in both traditional and non-traditional modes. Course includes high-profile guest speakers, a high level of student involvement in constructing learning activities, and experiential learning trips to complement the on-campus experience.

Not Available.

This course will build on a core concept of Lewis Mumford who understood media ecology as a component of spatial and urban ecology. Emphasis will be given on how space socially organizes human meaning and on the “inscription” of space. How do people, throUEh, their practices and their being in the world, form relationships with the locales they occupy (both the natural world and the build environment)? How do they attach meanings to spaces to create places? And how do the experiences of inhabiting viewing and hearing those places shape their meanings, communicative practices, cultural performance memories and habits? Course themes include; mapping and the imagination; vision and space, soundscape, architecture and landscape; new media and space/time compression; space and identity; spatial violence; spatialization of memory.

This course is a Dean’s Global Honors Seminar and available by application only.Eligible students are contacted directly. It includes travel to Florence, Italy during January 2018 and requires a $400 fee. This course explores the implications of having a disability in global contexts. Students will explore and identify factors, which can influence a community’s view of disability, including enablers and barriers to participation in daily life especially for people with disabilities.

Employing a global perspective, this course introduces students to the major issues and concepts regarding food and culture. Examining food and diet from historical and transnational perspectives, we examine the effect of colonialism and immigration on agriculture, food technologies, diets, and health. Through field trips, guest speakers, discussions, hands-on activities and eating, students explore how food influences and is influenced by myriad factors, including politics, economics, climate, geography, technology, and culture.

This course will examine the origins, development, and meaning of cultural conflicts around the world. How have cultural issues divided human beings, within their own countries and across them? How have these issues changed during our contemporary era of globalization, with its rapid spread of people and ideas across borders? How have these developments created new global alliances as well as fractures? And, most of all, how can we find common ground across our profound cultural and national differences? Special topics may include abortion, same-sex marriage, sex education, pornography, and drug regulation. Liberal Arts CORE Equivalent - satisfies the requirement for Cultures and Contexts.

Deep learning, a sub-field of machine learning and artificial intelligence, has promoted breakthroughs in managing and creating media content. This course provides a hands-on, project-oriented introduction to deep learning for the classification, retrieval, and creation of media content, with emphasis in audio-visual content. Students create and work with deep learning models using Python libraries, and think critically about their application for media. Students develop an understanding of how to use these tools in the context of their work.

Develops understanding and skills in the analysis and interpretation of demographic data using U.S. census, regional, and local data sets. Uses forecasting and strategic analysis methods as a basis for long-range planning of school facilities, programs, and client needs. Includes the use of computer-based methodologies, geographic information systems, and community asset mapping to formulate processes that connect schools with a wide array of higher education and community resources, including social service and health providers.

This seminar will introduce students to some of the central questions in history, the social sciences, the humanities, and the arts.

Seminar for doctoral students.