Computer Science Capstone Design

CS486H: Doing Capstone Design as an Honors course

 

Overview

The Honors program at NAU is a prestigious way to add special distinction to your CS studies and degree, and the CS programs faculty fully support students engaged in this ambitious degree variation.

There are not sufficient Honors students taking CS core courses to allow creation of entirely separate Honors sections of those courses. Instead, we accommodate Honors students by creating "specialized augmented versions" of existing courses: the student takes part in the regular course with other students, including all regular course assignments, but also negotiates specific extensions to the regular assignements in that course that are captured in a "CSxxx Honors Contract" that essentially serves as a modified addendum to the regular course description and syllabus. This then becomes the basis of an "Honors version" of the course.

This approach applies to the Capstone sequence as well: a special Honors section of CS486c can be created for Honors students on demand, with each Honors student in that section having an individually negotiated and customized Honors contract outlining expectations, deliverables, and evaluation basis. Having individualized Honors contracts for this course is required due to the unusual nature of the Capstone course: unlike "normal" courses, where all students are working on the same set of assignments, Capstone teams each have completely different projects to complete, based on project proposals submitted by external real-world clients. Thus, each Honors student will need to propose and negotiate specific additional challenges (beyond what their Capstone team has already agreed to do) that relate to and extend their particular project.

The process

The process for arranging an Honors version of CS486 is relatively simple, and generally is completed near the end of the preceeding CS476 (first course in Capstone sequence) semester, after the project solution vision has been refined and the student has a strong idea of what software product will be produced...and can therefore propose specific and meaningful extensions to complete as their Honors project. The specific steps in the process are:

  1. About four weeks before the end of the CS476 term, the student will contact the CS Capstone Coordinator to begin the process.
  2. The student will develop a proposal for a meaningful extension to the Capstone software product being developed that is not part of what is already being proposed by the team. Thus, the proposed project must be an extension to the team's project. Typically, the targeted extension is a "stretch goal" for the project, or exploration of some interesting advanced feature possibility (e.g., could we apply AI to do X for this part?). The overall guiding idea is that the proposed extension will not only be interesting for the student, but will provide added information/value to the client as well.
  3. The student will present the proposed project idea to the Capstone Coordinator. This typically involves a verbal conversation with the Capstone faculty in office hours, where the idea is presented and discussed. The idea is that one should come to basic agreement on the viability and substance of the project before the student invests time in writing it up.
  4. The student writes up the proposed Capstone extension as a formal proposal. Here is a boilerplate template that can be used, which also includes details of an anonymous specific proposed project just to give an idea of the level of detail/granularity that is needed. As should be clear from the sample, this doesn't need to cover every single detail of the proposed deliverables, but should be sufficient to ensure that faculty and student understanding of expectations is in agreement.
  5. The student presents the written contract draft (proposal) to the Capstone Coordinator for review. After review and possible refinement, both parties sign the Capstone contract.
  6. The student uses the signed Capstone contract as a basis for working with CS advising staff to enroll in the CS486H section (including creation of this section if one does not already exist).

Summary

In sum, the process of initiating an CS486 Capstone is fairly straightforward, providing students initiate the above process in a timely manner and can develop a viable extension idea. Successful completion of an Honors Capstone is a real achievement, and can be seen as a special distinction for the student that can often be cited as a sign of exceptional preparation in the subsequent job search process.