School of Agriculture and Natural Resources

Course Outline for AGSC 140

COMPUTER APPLICATIONS IN PRECISION FARMING II

Fall 2000

INSTRUCTOR:

GENERAL COURSE DESCRIPTION:

AGSC 140 is the second of two one-credit courses in the laptop curriculum of Agriculture Science involving the application of selective computer software in site-specific crop management. The course builds on the basic knowledge acquired by the student in AGSC 130 on global positioning systems (GPS) and geographic information systems (GIS). Students enrolled in AGSC 140 will pursue projects that involve the use of GPS and ArcView GIS software. Students will work in groups of 3 to 4 and are expected to present a team report at the end of the course and make presentations in the class using PowerPoint. Each student will also acquire some working knowledge with spreadsheet and database software to complement the computer tools discussed in both AGSC 130 and AGSC 140.

COURSE OBJECTIVES:

1. To provide the student with a learning experience on proposing, designing, and successfully completing a spatially-distributed data project involving the integrated use of GPS and GIS software.
2. To provide the student with an understanding on how these tools work together and in conjunction with a variety of other spatial data (field collected data, air photos, digital photos, etc..).
3. To acquaint the student with the use of computer technology in interpreting research data and making presentations.
4. To get the student acquainted with using the laptop in his/her courses.

OFFICE HOURS:

The instructor's designated office hours are on Tuesday (2:00 to 4:00 p.m.), Wednesday (11:00 a.m. to 12:00 noon), and Thursday (3:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m.). Given the nature of the course, students are encouraged to see the instructor on regular basis, during and even outside the scheduled office hours. Students with disabilities who require accommodations to fully-participate in the course activities are requested to contact the instructor within the first two weeks of the semester.

CONTACT HOURS AND CLASS SCHEDULE:

This is a one-credit hour course. The class is scheduled on Tuesdays, 6:00 to 6:50 p.m., Room 201, Charlton Hall. Initially, the contact hour will be used for lecture. Eventually the scheduled hour will be used for group discussions and class presentations.

TEXTBOOK(S):

There is no textbook to buy. Some reading material will either be made available on-line or placed on reserve at the library. However, students enrolled in AGSC 140 will have to be actively involved in acquiring pertinent knowledge from the on-line resources available on web. The following publications may serve as references:

ESRI. 1986-2000. Using ArcView GIS. Environmental Systems Research Institute, Redlands, California.

Hurn, J. 1989. GPS: A Guide to the Next Utility. Trimble Navigation, Sunnyvale, California.

Shayya, W.H. 2000. An Introduction to ArcView GIS (web tutorial). 

CLASS POLICIES:

• Attendance: Given the nature of the course, students are expected to be involved in an active learning environment and to work both independently and within a group. Nevertheless, students are urged to attend the scheduled lectures, group discussions, and presentations.

• Class Project: This course includes a project that will account for 90% of the final grade. Many milestones must be met during the semester culminating in a final team report, individual team-member report, and a class presentation. Although students are expected to work in teams on class projects, each student must have an individual complete project within the team project. At the end, each student must demonstrate that he/she know how to design a project, collect spatially-distributed data using GPS, display the data using ArcView GIS (and integrate such data with other spatial data), analyze geographic information, and learn from their successes and hardships. Good planning must be an integral part of the project as the required work must be completed in a timely manner and according to schedule.

• Academic honesty policy: The College imposes specific actions in response to incidents of plagiarism, cheating, and academic dishonesty. These procedures will be followed and appropriate actions will be taken if these event were to occur.

GRADE COMPOSITION:

• Assignments/Class Participation/Work Ethic ==> 10% of final grade
• Individual Team Member Critique (Friday - 15^th of December) ==> 15% of final grade
• Final Report - Submitted Electronically (10:00 a.m. on Monday - 18^th of December) ==> 45% of final grade
• Final Presentation - 15 minutes per project (Thursday - 14^th of December) ==> 30% of final grade

GRADING SCHEME:

The distribution of grades in this course will be based on the A-F College grading scheme. The letter grades correspond to the following percentage scale: A (90-100%), A- (87-89.9%), B+ (83-86.9%), B (80-82.9%), B- (77-79.9%), C+ (73-76.9%), C (70-72.9%), C- (67-69.9%), D+ (63-66.9%), D (60-62.9%), and F (<60%).

TENTATIVE OUTLINE OF TOPICS:

*The topics and corresponding dates listed in the table above are tentative and may be subject to change during the semester.