HoP Session Minutes (04/11/20) – Term 4/6 2020

Prior to the HoP session, HoP was provided with the consolidated feedback from students, collected by the ISTD Student Board.

Sections

Intro to Algo

Insufficient support materials
- Instructors also do not set aside any session to review materials live with students
- Suggested to have a similar arrangement to Infosys, where the first two sessions are recorded lectures, and the third session would be a cohort session to review material
Between the last feedback (in 2019) and now, the only difference is that homework are longer
- Commented that the new homework are harder than the problem sets
- Looking for more practical, implementation-based problems
Suggested to tailor the course to include algorithm design (problem-solving), on top of understanding the existing algorithms
Commented that mid-term exam duration (1h) was too short, 1.5h would make it more manageable

Responses

Prof Tony wondered if the current arrangement was due to Covid, and if it would improve if things were back to normal
- Students shared that instructors also used the cohort session as a lecture session instead of a tutorial during the previous batch
Prof Tony will communicate to the instructors to use the cohort session as a tutorial session, used to discuss/review material

Comp Struc

Workload is too high
Commented that mid-term exam duration (1h) was too short, 1.5h would make it more manageable

Responses

Prof Tony mentioned that the nature of the courses meant a relatively high workload, otherwise students would not be able to learn anything
Prof Tony also suggested that students make use of any learning opportunities (such as coaching sessions) in order to help revise and understand the material

Database and Big Data

Over-usage of TA
- Questions were redirected to the TA, who also appeared lost at times
Required to watch a 3h-long video
Comments on the weightage of various components
- Quiz vs project
  - 10% for each quiz is not very reasonable, considering that the project is 25%
- Also commented that quiz 1 was way too hard compared to what was taught
- Project’s scope is way too large for 25%
Lack practice materials
- Instructor did not release answers for the quiz, and students had to refer back to the 3h lecture
Too much theory and too little application
Suggested that the mod be split into 2 separate modules, DB and Big Data

Responses

Prof Tony would allow the instructor to focus on his area of expertise in the future, instead of needing to teach this mod
Under consideration to remove the Big Data section of the mod
Consider adjusting final exam arrangements and weightages

CDS

Labs not well-organised
Goal of CDS not well-understood, ML seems to overlap a lot with CDS
Also, instructors seem to assume students are doing ML even when it is not a co/pre-requisite course
Suggested to frame CDS as the applied component of ML instead (ML will teach the theory, CDS will teach how to use said theory)
CDS project is vague and feedback is insufficient

Machine Learning

Responses

Lecture recordings were eventually released
Prof Tony will inform the instructor to have a smaller data set for annotation in the future (to at least give some experience of annotating)

Mid-term survey

Some courses didn’t open the mid-term survey
- Comp Struc instructors had to make a special request to eDimension team to actually open up the survey

Responses

Prof Tony suggested to have mid-term survey open for all ISTD modules, and Felice would help inform the relevant personel for note in the future.

Pillar Name

Some students asked why not Computer Science and Design
- Differentiation from other CS schools
- Possible accreditation requirements
University proposed Computing Systems and Design, which many felt is unsuitable due to the lack of any reference point
Re-open a new poll to gauge student response towards the name change, what name would be good, and why.