This class teaches essential skills associated with the effective use of personal computers. There are two one-hour lectures and two one-hour labs per week, and additional open lab time either at home or on campus based upon an individual student's proficiency. There will be ten quizzes and a comprehensive lecture exam based upon the information presented in the lectures. There are fifteen lab units in which students will work directly with the software tools and there is hands-on testing at the conclusion of each module. There are also five class projects that will be done outside of class.
The typical expectation for a college course at CSU is that students will work at least 2-3 hours outside of class per class credit hour. A 4 credit class such as this one may require you to work more than 8 hours per week in addition to your classroom activities. A key objective of this course is that, by the end of the semester, every student will have the ability to collect data in his/her specific area of study, write a research paper, put together a presentation on that paper, and publish the information on the web. The information provided during the lectures provides an overview to successful publications while the labs provide hands-on experience with the tools.