Syllabus

COMP 5270 - 201 (#12535) Human-Computer Interaction
Tuesdays & Thursdays 2:00pm - 3:15pm, Falmouth Hall 209

Course details and policies are always subject to change. Revisions will be announced in class with sufficient time for students to account for them.

Instructors

Instructor

Prof. Samantha Reig (she/her)
Email: sam_reig@uml.edu
Office: Dandeneau 301
Office hours:
Tuesdays 11:00am - 12:30pm, Dandeneau 301
Thursdays 3:30pm - 5pm, Dandeneau 301
Zoom: by appointment

TA

Sharmin Sultana
Email: sharmin_sultana@uml.edu
Office hours:
Tuesdays 12:00pm - 1:00pm, Dandeneau 303 and Zoom (link on Blackboard)

Welcome!

I’m happy to have you in the class and excited to explore HCI with you. This syllabus contains information about the content of this class, classroom policies and norms, assignments, grading, our schedule, and university policies. It is a long document. Please read the whole thing. This information is important, and becoming familiar with it is a good use of your time.

Course description

The purpose of this class is to ground students in the basics of how humans interact with technology, and make students aware of the breadth of topic areas related to human-computer interaction (HCI). This course covers theoretical constructs such as the Model-Human Processor, and includes seminal readings by the original researchers. The course places a large emphasis on techniques for understanding users’ tasks, formulating users’ requirements, and assessing proposed designs using heuristic evaluation and other methods. As part of understanding users’ needs, students will consider social, organizational, and ethical perspectives on human-computer interaction. This course includes a project to design, develop, document, and orally present a prototype interface. At the end of the course students will be able to cite basic principles of human interaction and devise and carry out a usability engineering plan to aid in developing new interfaces.

Course learning outcomes

Upon successful completion of this course, students will demonstrate the ability to:

  1. Apply user-centered design processes in the ideation and implementation of novel systems
  2. Develop and refine designs for new software systems that consider usability concerns from the outset.
  3. Compare the strengths and weaknesses of different HCI techniques for a given design problem.
  4. Discuss open challenges in the field of human-computer interaction, including ethical, social, and policy implications of new designs.

Prerequisites

There are no prerequisites for this course. Students are expected to have proficiency with computers. Programming and graphic design skills may be helpful, but are not required.

Diversity and inclusion statement

The people in this class and in our UMass Lowell community come from diverse identities and backgrounds. Diversity includes a variety of dimensions, such as race, gender identity, ethnicity, sexual orientation, faith and non-faith perspectives, and many others. In this class, we will study ways in which system design can both support and exclude users along these dimensions. We must also be cognizant and respectful of identity—including dimensions not explicitly mentioned in this statement—when we design course materials, deliver course content, and interact with each other. It is my goal to make this class as accessible, approachable, and useful for all students as it can possibly be. If you have suggestions about how to better align the course with the values of diversity and inclusion, I encourage you to share them with me. If you’d rather do that anonymously, you can use this form:

COMP5270 - Spring 2024 Feedback Form

The Office of Multicultural Affairs (OMA) supports and advocates for students while leading diversity-related programming and working to create an inclusive environment for LGBTQ+ individuals via the LGBTQ+ Resource Center. Contact (978) 934-4336 or Multicultural_Affairs@uml.edu

Tutoring resources and Centers for Learning and Academic Support Services (CLASS)

CLASS will be offering tutoring and Writing Center services both in-person and virtually. I strongly urge you to take advantage of this opportunity to reinforce your learning.

Mental health and well-being

We are a campus that cares about your wellbeing and success. Your personal health and well-being are of utmost importance to faculty and campus administrators. I’m available to talk about your stresses or concerns related to your coursework in my class.

Here are some resources to support your well-being:

  • Counseling Services provide crisis intervention, assessment, referrals, short term individual counseling and group therapy. Call to book an appointment at (978) 934-6800.
  • UMatter2 is a university-wide initiative to support students and promote mental health. They can be reached at (978) 934-6671. You will find information at that website on how to access Togetherall, an online community which is a peer-to-peer platform dedicated to mental health support.
  • Centers for Learning and Academic Support Services (CLASS) provides advising services including goal setting, course selection, SIS functions, changing majors/minors and course deletions. (978) 934-2936 or Advisement@uml.edu.
  • The mission of the Office of Student Life & Wellbeing is to advance the holistic concept for student success by infusing health-promoting actions and collaboration into campus culture. They can be reached at 978-934-4342 or Wellbeing@uml.edu.

Accommodations

If you are registered with Disability Services and will require course accommodations, please notify me via the Accommodate semester request process as soon as possible so that we might make appropriate arrangements. It is important that we connect to discuss the logistics of your accommodations; please speak to me during office hours or privately after class as I respect and want to protect your privacy. If you need further information or need to register for academic accommodations, please visit the Disability Services Website.

Additionally, Student Disability Services supports software for ALL students (not just those registered with their office). The university has literacy software that allows you to read on-screen text aloud, research and check written work, and create study guides. You can download the software from the IT Software webpage on the UML assistive technologies website.

Textbooks/course materials

There are no required textbooks for this course. The following books are recommended:

Assessments

Your final grade will be based on the following components:

Component Individual or group Percentage
Participation Individual 5%
Homework assignments Individual 15%
Midterm Individual 30%
Final project Group (with an individually-graded teamwork survey) 50%
Total Individual 100%

Letter grades will be assigned based on the number of points you earn (out of 100):

Letter grade Range
A+ 97-100
A 93-96
A- 90-92
B+ 87-89
B 83-86
B- 80-82
C+ 77-79
C 70-76
F <70

Participation

Regular class attendance will be very much to your advantage. There will be material presented in class that is NOT included in the readings; you will only be able to obtain it by attending class. Also, there will be in-class exercises that will help you to understand and practice various techniques. Some of the midterm questions may be drawn from the in-class exercises. Finally, this class will incorporate a number of class discussions and chances to learn from fellow students. You will be expected to participate in discussions and exercises during class.

Once the final project kicks off, please tell your teammates if you’ll be absent from class so that they can prepare appropriately for work sessions and other activities that we/they might be planning to do during class time. If you are sick, please take care of yourself, and do not come to class. (We want our discussions to promote the exchange of ideas, not germs!)

Opportunities to participate outside of the class meetings themselves – e.g., sharing observations/links related to the class in Discord, attending lectures related to the class – will likely arise throughout the semester, so keep an eye out for those.

Homework assignments

There will be a handful of individual homework assignments throughout the semester. These assignments will allow you to practice core user-centered research skills such as wireframing, heuristic evaluation, and UI critiques prior to starting the group project. There will be an individual reflection homework assignment toward the end of the course. There will be a student survey at the beginning of the course, which will be graded for completion as part of the overall assignment grade.

Midterm

The midterm will be given in class. It will focus on everything we’ve covered up to that point. There will be multiple choice “right or wrong” answers that assess your knowledge of the technical content covered in lectures and readings as well as open-ended questions that allow you to apply what you’ve learned.

Final project

For your final project, you will design a prototype interface to address one or multiple needs of a user group. This will give you an opportunity to apply the principles of HCI and user research techniques to a specific application area. Interim deliverables, completed with your final project teammates, will be the building blocks for your final project. You will work in teams of 3-4 for this project.

The prototype should take into account the principles of HCI as well as your findings from the formative research activities you conduct for the interim deliverables. You must document how your final design incorporates knowledge from the class and from your formative research activities. The prototype does not have to be fully functional, but it needs to be interactive enough to convey the interface design to others. You may use prototyping methods and tools of your choice.

The project will be evaluated primarily based upon (1) the degree to which the interface effectively takes into account the principles of HCI and findings from your formative research activities (interim deliverables) and (2) how well the interface conveys the design. Clear articulation of your thought process, both in writing and verbally, is a crucial aspect of designing for and engaging with end users and clients. Therefore, clarity of expression will also factor into the assessment of all written and presented project components. A more detailed rubric will be available in the final project description documentation. The breakdown of the grading for the final project is as follows:

Component Points
Interim deliverables 20
Final report 15
Final presentation 10
Teammate assessment 5
Total 50

By default, all members of a group will receive the same grade on the interim deliverables, final report, and final presentation portions of the project (worth 45 points, or 90% of the project grade, all together). The teammate survey will be graded individually and used in determining how many of the remaining 5 points (10% of the project grade) each person will receive. I reserve the right to further adjust individual project grades in extreme cases, i.e., if there is a consensus among teammates that a group member went truly above and beyond or that someone really did not pull their weight. More details about the project will be available shortly after the start of the semester.

Course policies

Academic integrity

All students are advised that there is a University policy regarding academic integrity. Students are responsible for the honest completion and representation of their work. All work submitted must be your own. Submitting work that you did not produce and claiming that it is your own is plagiarism and is subject to disciplinary action according to UML’s policy.

Generative AI

In this class, you are welcome to use generative AI (e.g., ChatGPT, DALL-E) to make minor technical improvements to work that you yourself have done. For design, you may use it as a sounding board for ideas that you come up with. For writing, you may use it to copy edit your spelling and grammar after you’ve written an initial draft yourself. Use of generative AI that does not follow these guidelines will count as a violation of academic integrity.

Recordings

Class meetings will be recorded using Echo360 and posted to Blackboard. If you miss class, please review the recording. Do not attempt to download the recordings; this is a violation of university privacy policy. If you have trouble accessing a recording, let me know.

Late submissions

All assignments are due at 11:59pm Eastern Time on the day of the deadline unless otherwise specified. Deadlines in this course are structured to teach and reinforce specific concepts at specific times, help you make gradual and iterative progress on your final project, and balance out my grading load. I expect you to turn all of your work in on time, and it’s in your best interests to do so. If there are circumstances that prevent you from being able to turn in an assignment on time, contact me as soon as possible.

Regrades

I will review regrade requests if you think I’ve made a mistake. If you ask me to regrade your work, please provide an explanation of what is problematic about the grading and what you believe should be changed.

Email

Email is the best way to reach me. I try to turn emails around in 2 business days or less. If you haven’t heard back from me, or if it’s really urgent, feel free to nudge the message. I often handle emails in bulk and/or during non-business hours. If you receive an email from me late at night or during a weekend or holiday, please don’t see it as an obligation to respond right away. Please do not try to contact me via Microsoft Teams.

Office hours

Office hours are a great opportunity to discuss questions you have about the class, consult with me about your final project, and ask clarification questions about feedback I have given you on assignments. Office hours will run from Thursday, January 25th through Thursday, April 25th. There will be no office hours during spring break. If I am out of town and/or class is canceled on a day when the class usually meets, assume office hours are canceled that day too.

Devices

You are welcome to use computers, phones, tablets, etc. in this class to support your learning.

Food, drink, and masks

I ask that students avoid eating in class to the greatest extent possible. If you need to eat during class, please try to keep it as quick and unobtrusive as you can. We follow university guidelines on masking. Regardless of such guidelines, students are always welcome to wear a mask in this class if they choose to do so. I ask that you all respect each other’s choices regarding masking. In order to make this class as inclusive as possible, I reserve the right to change this policy at any time based on new information related to student accommodations and needs.

Credit hour policy

Federal definition of a credit hour requires that for every course credit awarded, a course must offer 15 hours of instructor-led course activities and 30 hours of out-of-class student work. This means that a standard 3 credit hour course requires 45 hours of instructor-led course activities and 90 hours of out-of-class student work.

University privacy statement

UMass Lowell recognizes the importance of mutual trust between students and faculty. Massachusetts is a two-party consent state, which means it is illegal to record someone without their permission. Recordings of classroom lectures are the intellectual property of the instructor. Instructors have the right to prohibit audio and video recording of their lectures, unless the requesting student is registered with Disabilities Services and recording of class sessions is an approved accommodation. In addition, sharing or selling recordings of classroom activities, discussions or lectures with any other person or medium without permission of the instructor is prohibited.

Campus closures

In the event that campus is closed (snow day, power outage, etc.) on a day when class meets, please check your email in the morning for an update from me. Based on my assessment of the best way to proceed under the specific circumstances of the campus closure and our progression through the class, I may hold a virtual class, cancel class, or share a recorded lecture with you.