Optional Individual Project

Students who successfully complete all the annotations, individual and team assignments will earn a grade of B or B+ (with B+ indicative of the extra value you have added to our discourse in the course). Those who wish to try for an A or A- must complete an Individual Project by Monday, December 17. If you wish to collaborate with another student on your project you must clearly carve out your own individual part and contribution to the project, and add your descriptions of your individual contributions as an addendum to your project.

To be eligible to propose an optional project you must have at least an average of 3 on the Sample and AGHA scales and no outstanding Us. For those who choose to do an Individual Project for the course, you must write a project proposal that rises to the level of "4" on the Sample scale by Monday, November 19. 

For those who choose to do an Individual Project for the course, you have a number of options, but most of them require the development of a topical page for our Scalar Book. Your Project can take a number of forms but must demonstrate your own original thinking and include a statement of your Standpoint. 

Format

As for the format, you are encouraged to stretch beyond your usual modes of academic communication and use at least some of the multimedia affordances of Scalar and hypothes.is. Of course your page can take the form of a traditional paper (with APA format), but it may take the form of a Scalar book, a Scalar media gallery, a photo essay, critique, critical annotation of a video using VideoAnt, or a storytelling project using an app such as Wakelet, Medium, or Tic-Tok. (You may find hypothes.is useful for some of these formats.) Whatever form you choose be sure to do background research on the general rules for effective communication in that format.

Steps

The first step is to post a plan statement explaining the rationale of your Project (if collaborating with another student you must clearly provide a rationale for collaborating and delineate your separate parts of the project). Your statement of rationale should include a brief statement about how the project will reflect your learning of specific theories, research, and key concepts in the course so far. That is, what did you learn in the course, or what questions did the course prompt, that form the basis of your proposal? To be certain of the doability of your project you should state what form, process, and media you plan to use. This should be added as a path from your parent page. This is due no later than Monday, November 19th by midnight.

Your Project plan statement will have seven main parts: (1) a working title; (2) your standpoint statement (why this is important to you); (3) a statement of the question/issue you plan to address; (4) a statement of your project's rationale (see above); (5) a tentative list of the types of media that you will employ and a brief rationale in choosing them; (6) a brief bibliography; and (7) a timeline for completing your project.

• The working title: titles often work with metaphors or images, so thinking of one early may give you a surprisingly powerful tool the thinking about your project’s goals.
• Standpoint statement: What personal beliefs, attitudes, experience, and/or point of view do you bring to this issue? How do you plan to keep your own biases under reflective observation?
• The question you’d like your project to pursue. State this as a question! 
• The list of media: if you are writing a traditional paper or essay, this could take the form of an outline; if you are planning a media heavy project this could take the form of a media plan as described in Scalar 2 Guidelines. If you are doing a map or timeline, it could take the form of a list of events and places.
• Bibliography: This will consist of a list of sources you have researched that may be helpful to you in exploring the issue/question your project is focused on. Items from some of our readings may be helpful to you. To the extent possible use original sources. Avoid using sites such as Wikipedia unless they are objects of your analysis.
• The timeline for completion: here you will map out the steps towards completion of your project, allotting your best estimate of the time you’ll need to devote to each.

Grading (adapted from Mark Sample)

In order to earn an A your Project must be focused and coherently integrate examples with explanations or analysis. The project should demonstrate awareness of its own limitations or implications, and considers multiple perspectives when appropriate. The Project must reflect in-depth engagement with the topic.

In order to earn an A- your Project must contain all of the required elements, be reasonably focused, and explanations or analysis based on examples or other evidence. Connections are made between ideas, and though new insights are offered, they are not fully developed. The Project reflects adequate engagement with the topic.

Projects that are underdeveloped, mostly description or summary, without consideration of alternative perspectives, and with few connections made between ideas will not earn an A or A- for the course.