Compared with Berkeley\’s list of student-taught classes, CMU stuco courses seem relatively tame.
Selecting my schedule shouldn\’t be as hard as my last semester in Berkeley, but somehow I am caught in indecisiveness. Should I be a typical part-time student and take only 2 courses? Or should I take advantage of the fact the university considers me as a full-time student and take 3 courses?
Right now, I definitely have to take:
Programmable User Interfaces
I am sort of excited for this one. Finally, I get to assert my minimal programming skills to create interfaces. People say this course is time-consuming, but how can it be time-consuming when you\’re doing something you love? And iterations abound. I assume we\’ll be creating an interface and bettering it as the semester goes by. Hopefully, there\’s no busy work like creating code for programs that are irrelevant in the real world.
Interaction and Interface Design
Again, excited! At the beginning of the semester, I was very nervous about Communication Design Fundamentals, because it felt so disorienting to have my work critiqued in front of everyone. But now I feel better about it. And I like seeing other people\’s work…and getting feedback about my own. Seems like this is how IID will be like. And furthermore, the course seems like I\’ll actually come away with something to show to potential employers. That I created THIS.
And what about my third course? Considering how I enjoy a class more if there\’s people I know in there…I am slightly wary of stepping outside HCI. Yet my interests aren\’t similar to other people\’s in the program. I was thinking of a Pro-Social Behavior seminar, a Studio X: Home 2020 (you get to design a futuristic house with sensors and everything!!!! so cool!), Conceptual Models…
Anyway, thinking of a StuCo class. Unlike History of Breasts…they have, you guess it, How to be a Player (apparently people at CMU are undateable – the course is about the science of dating, how to get a date, how to be charming, how to be appealing to others – but I thought I already got this one down?)