Independent Work - Civic Computing Projects

Overview:

The Independent Work (IW) projects in this seminar will center on the theme of “Civic Computing,” where projects should have an impact by helping some community of interest. AB juniors who wish to do their JIW in the context of this seminar, or BSE juniors/seniors who wish to do COS 398/498 in the context of this seminar, should sign up with Colleen Kenny.

The theme for this seminar is inspired by the “civic hacking” community whose mission objective can be described by the following examples:

For further motivation, read the first chapter of Josh Tauber's book, Open Government.

This IW seminar is not about hacking. In general, the goal of this seminar is to develop IW projects that can have an impact - locally, nationally or even globally. Projects may involve and/or extend existing (open-source) projects, or they can be entirely new ventures. Projects can involve mobile devices, web platforms, cloud-based backends, open APIs/data, hardware sensors, etc. But the end result should, quite simply, help people and communities in some way.


Expectations:

  1. Students are expected to research and define their own “problem area.” Students are expected to apply their own interests and passions to define a project.
  2. We will have weekly meetings, where each student must provide a status report for their project. These meetings are mandatory.
  3. Students will also schedule weekly meetings with the instructor to ensure their IW is on track.
  4. Depending on schedules, we will likely participate in a few relevant “meetups.” For example, the BetaNYC Meetup holds periodic meetings in New York to discuss civic-related projects. Other potential meetups include Princeton-Tech and NYC-Internet of Things. Students may even present their work at these meetups.
  5. Projects must comply with all IW requirements.
  6. Students should contact Dr. Kaplan (ak18 [at] cs princeton edu) to find out more information.


Potential Project Topics:

Project Ideas - Links to Sites:

Many of thes elinks point to open-source/civic-related projects. Investigate these sites. You will likely discover some excellent ideas for projects!

Interesting Twitter Feeds: