Surveys the key theories, concepts, and themes of information science. Examines information and communication technologies from the perspective of the people and organizations that generate and use information to achieve their goals. Topics include: information and decision making; human information processing; definition and types of information systems; behavioral impact of information technologies such as office automation, e-mail, and the World Wide Web; legal and policy issues such as privacy, censorship, intellectual property and information security. A course project will explore the use and impact of information technology in a selected domain (such as e-commerce, education, medicine, government, law enforcement or electronic publishing), focusing on both technical and behavioral issues.

Discusses the planning, analysis, design, and implementation of computer-based information systems, focusing on the methodologies and procedures used in organizational problem solving and systems development. Topics include: the systems development life cycle; project management; requirements analysis and specification; feasibility and cost-benefit analysis; logical and physical design; prototyping; system validation, deployment, and post-implementation review. Additional topics may include: platform and database selection and integration issues; CASE tools; end-user training; maintenance; and object-oriented analysis and design.

Discusses information retrieval including: document models, indexing, query techniques and results evaluation; text analysis for searching, indexing and compression; user interfaces for text and multimedia retrieval; digital libraries. Additional topics may include: parallel and distributed architectures; support for multimedia and image retrieval; specialized query strategies; advanced retrieval models. Coursework includes using and evaluating existing IR systems as well as implementing small-scale applications that illustrate indexing and retrieval strategies.

Studies the principles of human-computer interaction and the practice of user interface design. Discusses the major human information processing sub-systems (perception, memory, attention, and problem-solving), and how the properties of these systems influence the design of interactive systems. Reviews guidelines and specification languages for designing user interfaces, with an emphasis on toolkits of standard graphical-user-interface objects. Introduces usability metrics and evaluation methods. Additional topics may include: World Wide Web design principles and tools; wireless/mobile device interfaces; computer-supported cooperative-work; information visualization; virtual reality. Coursework includes designing user interfaces, creating working prototypes using a GUI toolkit, and evaluating existing interfaces using the methods studied.

Students learn to critically evaluate and conduct empirical research, focusing on the use of empirical methods to study the effectiveness and organizational/social impact of information systems and technologies. Empirical research involves a number of broad steps including: identifying problems; developing specific hypotheses; collecting data relevant to the hypotheses; analyzing the data; and considering alternative explanations for the empirical findings. Some of the most commonly used research techniques including surveys, experiments, and ethnographic methods are discussed. Additional topics include the ethics of data collection and experimentation in behavioral science. Although the course focuses primarily on the relationship between formulating research questions and implementing the appropriate methods to answer them, students can expect to apply the statistical techniques learned in the course prerequisites.

This capstone course enables students to develop a sophisticated understanding of the interaction between technology and its context. Students write an in-depth research paper that reflects upon and analyzes the observations and experiences of both coursework and co-op using the information science literature to interpret and better understand those experiences. Students then participate in a seminar in which they present the results of their research.

A lecture course in information science on a topic not regularly taught in a formal course. Topics may vary from offering to offering.

Under faculty supervision, a student will work on a substantial project in information science.

The Junior/Senior Honors Project courses are not normally offered as lecture courses but may be available to individual Honors students by arrangement with an instructor.

The Junior/Senior Honors Project courses are not normally offered as lecture courses but may be available to individual Honors students by arrangement with an instructor.

Under faculty supervision, a student will prepare an undergraduate thesis.

Under faculty supervision, a student will continue to prepare an undergraduate thesis.