Written on October 25, 2018

Town Hall Minutes Fall 2018

Minutes from the semi-annual Computer Science Graduate Student Town Hall on October 25, 2018.

Agenda

(PhD) Clarify the degree requirements and post it in the website
Conversation on degree requirements is happening right now, sending out proposals for feedback soon
Overhauled the Graduate Student Handbook over summer - if something still isn’t clear, please let CSGSA know so we can clarify
(PhD) What do (other students) value in a breadth requirement?
- (PhD) Two perspectives: foundation everyone should have, or way to encourage everyone to explore new areas?
- (PhD) Different graduate students want different things out of breadth- Masters might be looking to prep for specific industry positions (i.e. applied), where PhD might want to be prepared to teach a variety of classes outside their research area
(Sriram) Goal: make requirements small and keep them minimal, possibly make the same across the board for all graduate students
- Things outside out control: how many distance classes, total class, within the department, etc.
(PhD) 4/5 breadth courses is a lot
(PhD) Will new requirements allow PhD to pick up Masters along the way? Yes

Course Availability
- How would minimal requirements affect course availability?
- What courses are offered in summer?
  - Two this summer- multilingual NLP and graphics, both with distance sections
Course Issues
- (Masters) After drop date, the professors have just decided to completely abandon syllabus- is there some form of accountability?
  - FCQs, but be nice and constructive
  - Please feel free to approach one of the Grad directors/Jim throughout the semester
- Are the expectations the same for graduate (6000/7000) courses?
  - Some ambiguity between 7000 topics and the 7000 that’s going to be turned into a 5/6000
  - Suggestion: Renumber 7000 transitioning courses
- Methods of CogSci is 6000 means it can’t count as breadth. Any class can be depth with advisor approval

(Masters) Many TAs have to (interview) grade in public areas- violation of FERPA
- Want to give out grading space before office space
- How far in advance do we know when we’ll need interview grading space?
  - Depends on the course
  - Classes with more interview grading, allocate larger chunks of space, but some classes only have interview grading as needed
  - Card access for interview grading rooms after 5pm gets removed
(PhD) desire for kitchen where you can actually cook and hopefully
Other departments have grad lounges where community is built
ECES 112 reserved for graduate students Mondays 8am-1pm
- 8:30-9:30 is used for TA training
- 12-1pm is used for CSGSA
Do graduate student use CSEL? Yes, for group projects
Why aren’t we getting a new building?
- We need the Dean to be a CS person
- Movement to promote Jim to Dean Martin
No interaction between students in different labs
Is there a way to partition CSEL with a part for Grad students
Is there a way to use hotelling offices for interview grading?
- Issue is key access, using conference rooms is alternative
- If it has key access, can request for card access with the new system used on east campus
- Could we use a combination lock containing key in the meantime?
- Study rooms cannot be used for interview grading, but has anyone tried using study rooms in libraries?
  - Business, Norlin, math libraries
  - If they notice you’re turning it into an office, you might not be allowed to book it anymore