Each academic staff member is expected to supervise projects for MIT students enrolled in ITEC808, ITEC809, ITEC810 or ITEC811. The most commonly taken unit is ITEC810, which is a one semester project unit worth 4 credit points; ITEC811 is a larger one-semester project unit worth 8 credit points; ITEC808 and ITEC809 form a sequence of two 4-credit-point units that provide a means for spreading the ITEC811 large project across two semesters. The relationship between the four units is explained in more detail here.
Being an ITEC project unit supervisor means that you provide specifications for projects that you'd like to see students carry out, and you supervise the students as they carry out their projects. Both of these tasks are further described below.
Since there are typically around 30 students requiring projects each semester, all academic members of staff are asked to develop two (or more) short project specifications. It is in your interests to propose projects that are both attractive to you and likely to be attractive to students; otherwise, you might be asked to supervise a project defined by someone else. MIT students will be asked to select a project from amongst those on offer; alternatively, they may approach or be assigned to an appropriate member of staff with their own idea for a project.
A call for project specifications will be issued several weeks in advance of the commencement of each semester, so that we have a full complement of project specifications for students to peruse before the semester begins.
ITEC810 projects are much smaller than honours projects: they take place over one semester, and are worth four credit points, accounting for 12.5% of the student's degree (in contrast, for example, with the 40% of an honours degree that an honours project represents).
ITEC810 is a four credit point unit, so the student is expected to spend 12 hours on the unit for each of the 15 weeks in the semester (the two-week recess is included in these calculations). When we subtract class time and time for other non-project-related items, this means that an ITEC810 project is something the student should be able to achieve working full-time on it for 4 weeks: see here for a more detailed discussion of the workload in the unit. It's very important that, when you specify your projects, you take appropriate account of what's feasible in this kind of time frame.
Students taking ITEC808, 809 or 811 undertake projects that are approximately twice the size of an ITEC810 project.
It's important to recognise that the vast majority of the students who undertake ITEC810 are not going on to a research career, and this unit is not supposed to represent a research project in the conventional sense of that term. Please try to propose projects that are suitable in this regard. Suitable projects can include software development subtasks which are not themselves research tasks, but may serve as useful infrastructural contributions to your own research program.
When you propose a project, you should indicate whether it is an analysis project or a development project. The former typically do not require programming; the latter typically do. In the past, some of the students who did development projects have felt that those doing analysis projects have gotten off lightly, so it's important to ensure that analysis projects are not just an easy option; in particular, an analysis project must be more than simply a literature review or a review of the state of the art, and should involve a serious intellectual contribution beyond rote cataloguing.
Each project outline should be no more than one page in length. It should consist of:
Note that, in particular, the specification should not say much about how to approach the project, since this is something the students will be required to write up in their own words as part of an assignment.
The information you provide in your project specification is available to students on the projects list web page, so it would be particularly appreciated if you would use this simple HTML template to provide the above information.
Here's a summary of the work expected of supervisors, with more detail on some elements of this further below.
You are expected to meet with your student for around 1 hour each week. Many of our students work full time and so are only able to be on campus outside normal business hours, so finding a mutually convenient time can be challenging. Please try to be as accommodating as possible; in most cases your schedule will be more flexible than the student's.
Students hand in a number of items of work for assessment during the semester; some are assessed by the unit convenor and some are assessed by the supervisor. The table below indicates who is responsible for assessing each assessable item, and also gives an estimate of the amount of work required of supervisors to carry out their assessments tasks.
| Item | Length | Assessment Load | Submission Due | Assessment Due | Assessor |
| Weekly Progress Reports | Half a page | -- | Friday every week | Same day | Convenor |
| Initial Project Plan | 5 slides | -- | Friday 14th August | Monday 17th August | Convenor |
| Project Proposal | 5-6 pages | 2 hours | Friday 21st August | Friday 28th August | Convenor |
| Ethics Assignment | 5-6 pages | -- | Friday 2nd October | Friday 9th October | Convenor |
| Report Outline | 5-6 pages x 3 | 6 hours | Friday 16th October | Friday 23rd October | Supervisor |
| Final Project Report | 40 pages x 2 | 10 hours | Friday 13th November | Friday 20th November | Supervisor |
| Final Project Presentation | 20-minute presentation | -- | Evening Friday 13th November | Friday 13th November | Session Chair |
| Class and Web Participation | -- | -- | -- | Friday 20th November | Convenor |
Each time you are asked to assess a piece of work, you will be provided with an assessment rubric; rather than provide numerical scores, you are asked to indicate the level of the work by selecting one of a number of descriptive categories (Unsatisfactory, Functional, Proficient, Advanced) for a number of specific dimensions of assessment.
Note that, for the Report Outline, you are asked to assess the work of two students in addition to that of your own student; and in the case of the Final Report, you are asked to assess the work of one student in addition to that of your own. This is an attempt to achieve some calibration in marking.
You are also asked, if at all possible, to attend the end of semester workshop, and if so, possibly to chair a session. Currently the workshop is scheduled to take place the evening of Friday 13th November, so your student will be most appreciative if you schedule that into your diary at the beginning of semester to ensure that you can attend.
Please note that students are asked to present a statement of the objectives of their agreed project at the first ITEC810 class (in 2009H2, this falls on Friday 14th August), so it is essential that they meet with you during Week 1.
I will be asking students to take responsibility for all of the following:
Let me know by email when you have formally agreed to take on a particular student for a particular project by emailing me the student name and project title.
Respond to student enquiries promptly, especially at key times such as when projects are being decided, and when assignment deadlines are approaching.
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