Students: Check Announcements page frequently!

Also, see new Speakers link! Speakers’ slides now in Resources.

Upcoming Deadlines:
  • Because you asked, we decided in class on 4/22 that the final write-up for the Self-Learning exercise will now be due on Monday, April 26, at 11:50m.
  • The research reflection short paper assignment is now described on Collab. (See the Assignments page.) It will be due on Thursday, May 6 (which is your scheduled final exam period -- no, we don't have an exam). We’ll make the time it’s due 11:50 pm.


Seminar Manager:
  • Dr. Tom Horton
  • Office: Olsson 228B
  • Phone: 982-2217
  • Office Hours: Mo Tu Th 11am-noon
  • Email: horton.uva(at)gmail.com

The CS2190 seminar is required experience for students in the 2nd year of their BSCS degree. General course goals are:
  • One goal is to expose 2nd years to state-of-the-art research in computer science. Learning about areas of computing will help you choose electives, choose a senior thesis topic, decide on directions for your career or graduate school, identify faculty with whom you'd like to do research with during the summer or academic term, etc.
  • A second goal is to explore professional, ethical, legal, security and social issues and responsibilities relevant to computing. These may include "contemporary issues" relative (e.g. patents, privacy, open-source, socially-relevant computing, work-force issues, education).
  • You will see that you can engage in independent learning of computing topics or skills, so that you can end up being an effective “life-long learner”.
  • An additional goal is to give BSCS students in their second year a chance to get to know each other and develop a stronger relationship as a "cohort". Activities will be structured so that students interact, and thus class participation in such activities is explicitly part of what you do in this course.
In summary, this course is intended to help you grow as a computer scientist in a variety of dimensions. We believe that having this kind of experience in the 2nd year will improve what you get out of the rest of your BSCS degree.

Course Objectives: Upon completion the course, a student will:
  • Have been exposed to a wide range of state-of-the-art research topics in computer science and related disciplines.
  • Have begun preparing to undertake an in-depth research project in computer science or a related field.
  • Have been exposed to issues and questions in ethics and professionalism in computer science.