Assignment 4: Progress Report

Summary

At this point, your goal shifts to making progress on your project. Each week, we will be asking you to share an update on your team's progress during the week, and plans for the next week. You'll be sharing these reports in section and getting feedback from other teams and the TA.

Vectoring

Start the week by meeting with your team to perform vectoring. What is currently the riskiest unanswered question in your project? What is core to answering that question, and what is periphery?

Plan

Your answer to the vectoring question should make clear what you need to focus on. Identify a goal that your team thinks is achievable in one week to reduce the risk on the dimension of your selected vector.

Execute that plan this week.

Report

Meet with your group to perform vectoring for the next week. How far did you get, benchmarked against the goal you set? What is your new vector? (In other words, what is now the riskiest unanswered question in your project?)

Submit a PDF of your progress report on Canvas. It should have the following sections, with a short paragraph for each section, totaling about one page:

• This week's vector: what is the vector, and why is that the riskiest unanswered question right now? (In future weeks, it will be fine to copy-paste this section from the "next week's vector" section of last week's progress report.)
• This week's plan: What is core and periphery, given that vector? What was your concrete goal to achieve by the end of the week to reduce uncertainty in that vector? (In future weeks, it will be fine to copy-paste this section from the "next week's plan" section of last week's progress report.)
• This week's result: What happened? Did this reduce uncertainty in the vector you selected?
• Next week's vector: what is the vector, and why is that the riskiest unanswered question given what you learned this week?
• Next week's plan: What is core and periphery, given that vector? What is your concrete goal to achieve by the end of the week to reduce uncertainty in that vector?
• One sentence per person: what that individual did this week

Add a slide summary of your responses to your section's weekly report slides. These slides will be shared in section each week as you report out to the TA and to other teams. A template is available here.

• AI Checkin Slides
• HCI Checkin Slides
• Systems Checkin Slides

Timeline

Executing this project will be your team's focus for the rest of the course. Here is a reminder of the timeline:

• Week 4: Introduction due; start executing the project
• Weeks 5-8: work on the project, with weekly check-in assignments
• Week 8: Evaluation plan due in addition to the weekly check-in assignment
• Week 9: Draft paper due
• Week 10: Final presentation in class
• Finals: Final paper due

Submission

Submit a PDF with your weekly report. Add your slide to the section's Google Slides slideshow. This is a group assignment; create a group for your team, and one member should submit on behalf of the group.

Grading

Your project report will be graded on the following rubric:

• Vector: Did you select a vector that captures the main source of uncertainty in your project right now? (5pt)
• Plan: Did you create a plan that should reduce uncertainty in that vector? Is that plan achievable in a week? (5pt)
• Velocity: Did you make reasonable progress on your plan? We assume that plans may need to evolve as the week goes and you may need to re-vector midweek. We're not grading on whether you stuck exactly to the plan, but on whether you maintained high velocity on your project. (5pt)