Syllabus

Spring 2007

Course Information:
Section 001: Tuesday/Thursday, 9:30 a.m. to 10:45 p.m., in SSB 216. ref # 48131. Course home page: http://www.d.umn.edu/~cstroupe/sp07/5230/001.

Professor Information:
Dr. Craig Stroupe, cstroupe@d.umn.edu, 218-726-6249, Humanities 425, Office Hours Tuesday/Thursday, 11 a.m. to noon or other times and days by appointment.

Purpose | Expectations | Resources Needed | Grades

Purpose

This class is intended to teach you the aesthetic, cultural, and rhetorical uses of Web-design techniques—including writing—and not just the technological tools. The class is designed, however, assuming that you have no prior knowledge of Web design, and providing you with introductions and resources to master to the basic skills.

In this class, you will gain practice and expertise in the following areas:

applying principles of rhetoric, design, cultural theory, and creative thinking to your Web-design work and writing;
discussing your work in critically informed ways;
writing critically and knowledgeably about issues and questions raised by the digital culture;
conceiving and carrying out writing/design projects that engage potential audiences on a variety of levels;
participating in and contributing to a community of writer/designers;
learning to develop successful working relationships with clients and support teams, which are especially necessary in the creation of documents for institutions, businesses, and civic organizations;
using a variety of software to create documents for delivery via the Internet.

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Expectations

Exercises and Projects

This course is organized as a series of project and exercises.

The projects are long-term, individual works which you will work on over a period of weeks.

The exercises are activities done together in class, usually in 15 to 30 minutes.

The Projects. As described on the Works Page, the projects are larger pieces of work that you'll complete individually over a period of two or three weeks using the skills you've learned from the exercises and insights from the readings and class activities. The projects are Web sites/pages, including a "Client Project" for a real-life organization, individual, business, professor, or campus unit of your own choosing. You will also have an opportunity to do a "global revision" of one of the projects.

There is a three-point penalty per day for late projects, including the commentaries and printouts that are explained below.

Due dates for all requirements are included in the online schedule, which will be updated throughout the semester.

Exercises. We'll do the exercises together in class to learn particular skills or techniques, and you'll have 24 hours after the class meeting (if needed) to complete and post each exercise to the Web for credit.

I will give you detailed directions for submitting particular, finished projects and exercises. The following, however, are some general guidelines:

All Web-based projects should be:

posted to the Web,
the URL sent to the Webx discussion board
a written commentary printed out (not e-mailed) and handed in at the beginning of the first class meeting after the due date. The commentary is an integral part of the assignment, and will count significantly in the evaluation.

Commentaries

The commentary should explain—in at least one substantive paragraph, and no more than two pages—how your project fulfills the criteria and goals of the assignment. More than just a list of mechanical features, your commentary is a chance to make big claims for your project as you look back at it—even if you weren't aware of everything you were accomplishing at the time you were working. In the commentary, explain why you did what you did.

Use terms from the readings and class discussions to put the project and the process of creating it in critical focus. These critical terms should be in bold.

This explanation should also reflect the depth of your understanding of the assignment and the meaning of your work fulfilling it: that is,

what it asks you to do rhetorically and creatively,
what issues of writing and design it raises,
what's interesting about it as an occasion for social, cultural, civic, or cultural work
what it led (or leads) you to realize about web design and/or digital culture.

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Other Writing and Design Work

In addition to the design, creation, and writing of the exercises and projects themselves, you will complete:

writings on our online Webx discussion board
brainstorming sessions and preliminary writings or designs for your projects,
peer critiques for workshops
other writings.

While there is no final exam in this class, you will have assignments due by that time and date, which are specified on the schedule.

Readings

On days when readings are assigned, please do the following:

have the readings done by the beginning of class;
expect brief quizzes or guided reading responses at the beginning or end of class. There are no make-ups on these responses if you are absent, late or leave early.

Attendance

Since this class will function as a community of writer-designers, your regular attendance is absolutely necessary.

Absences: For Tuesday/Thursday classes, absences in excess of 3 will deduct 3 percentage points each from your overall grade. For night classes, absences in excess of 2 will deduct 3 percentage points each from your overall grade
These possible absences can be spent however you wish and so there are no excused or unexcused absences. Save your "free" absences for a rainy (or snowy) day.
If you are absent, you are responsible for all material covered in class.
In the case of absences or lateness, some requirements like quizzes and guided in-class activities cannot be made up when timeliness or group interaction is critical.
In addition to your budget of allowed absences, you also have instances of arriving late or leaving early to use (with or without an excuse) if necessary: 3 for Tuesday/Thursday classes, 2 for night classes. Instances in excess of these allowed occasions will decrease your overall grade by 2 percentage points each. If during the semester you need to leave class early, even if it's one of your allowed instances, please arrange it with me in advance.

Participation

A larger goal of this course is to establish a community or network of writer-designers—with a wide variety of backgrounds, expertise, and interests—to enhance your learning and enjoyment during the next sixteen weeks. The class is designed to provide a number of avenues for this community building, including peer workshopping and critiquing, in-class "studio sessions," support groups, and various Internet-based communications and collaborations. Your sincere and regular contributions to maintaining this collaborative environment will count in your grade and of course will greatly benefit your final products in the course.

Because your work is the subject matter for this course, turning in all projects and writings on time is critical; work turned in late will be assessed a 3% penalty per day.

Special Needs

If you have a disability, either permanent or temporary, which might affect your performance in this class, please notify me at the beginning of the semester. Methods, material, or testing will be adapted as required for equitable participation.

Incompletes

Incompletes for the semester will be given only in the following very limited circumstances:

you must contact me in advance of the semester's end to make a request for an incomplete;
no more than one or two weeks of class, or one or two assignments, can have been missed;
you must be in good standing in the class (not already behind, in other words);
you must have a documented family or medical emergency, as required by university policy;
you must arrange a time table with me for completing the missed work that is acceptable for both of us.

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Resources Needed

Jakob Nielsen's Designing Web Usability. New Riders Publishing, 2000
Negrino and Smith, Macromedia Dreamweaver 8. Thomson Course Technology, 2006
a UMD e-mail account
a USB drive (a.k.a., jump drive, pocket drive, thumb drive) for saving and transporting your work (at least 100 Mg.)
occasional access to a digital camera, which can be checked out from ITSS.
access to a printer, or funds for printing

Grades

Your work on the major projects and various exercises (weighed according to the size and complexity of the project): 90%
Participation in class generally, including in-class activities and contributions, online discussions, attendance, conferences, quizzes, peer workshop responses, Webx discussions, class discussion, promptness: 10%

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