Online courses directory (25)

In the last half of the 20th century, the role of computation in the sciences grew rapidly, driven by advances in silicon-based processors, fiber-optic networks, a host of numerical algorithms, and sets of standard protocols for processing and exchanging data. Much of this digital technology now permeates everyday life. Building on these and emerging technologies, the 21st century is poised to unleash a new, data-intensive paradigm of scientific discovery that will dramatically enhance the scope and scale of data capture, curation, and analysis. In this new (4th) paradigm, cures for cancer might be found by the collective investigations of agents computing "in the cloud.

The vaunted Information Revolution is more than Web surfing, Net games, and dotcoms. Indeed, it is the foundation for an economic and social transformation on a scale comparable to the Industrial Revolution of the nineteenth century. As a culture we have learned from earlier such transformations and it is important to recognize those lessons and chart a path toward intellectual and practical mastery of the emerging world of information. This course will provide the foundational knowledge necessary to begin to address the key issues associated with the Information Revolution. Issues will range from the theoretical (what is information and how do humans construct it?), to the cultural (is life on the screen a qualitatively different phenomenon from experiences with earlier distance-shrinking and knowledge-building technologies such as telephones?), to the practical (what are the basic architectures of computing and networks?). Successful completion of this "gateway" course will give you, the student, the conceptual tools necessary to understand the politics, economics, and culture of the Information Age, providing a foundation for later study in Information or any number of more traditional disciplines. Course Level: Undergraduate This Work, SI 110 - Introduction to Information Studies, by Robert Frost is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike license.

Ethics and Information Technology focuses on the ethical dilemmas that exist where human beings, information objects, and social computing technologies interact. The course explores emerging ethical models from historical and cross-cultural perspectives and then applies these models to a variety of new and emerging technologies that are inherently social in their construction and use. Initial examples of issues that the course covers in discrete modules include: the integrity of digital content in a networked world; identity and avatars; and interpersonal engagement through online games and virtual environments. Students explore the technological underpinnings of associated technology systems, experiment with individual and group interaction with technologies, and examine the mechanics of ethical and unethical behaviors. Course Level: Undergraduate This Work, SI 410 - Ethics and Information Technology, by Paul Conway is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike license.

To appreciate the opportunities and make wise choices about the use of technology, information professionals need to understand the architectures of modern information systems. In alternative system architectures, storage, communication, and processing substitute for and complement each other in different ways. This course introduces students, at several different levels of abstraction, to sets of functional components and alternative ways of combining those components to form systems. It also introduces a set of desirable system properties and a core set of techniques that are useful in building systems that have those properties. Course Level: Graduate This Work, SI 502 - Networked Computing: Storage, Communication, and Processing, by Charles Severance is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution license.

This course introduces students to the conceptual, institutional, and practical foundations of information policy analysis and design. The course explores the regulatory histories, paradigms, processes, and actors shaping the ongoing development of the information field. Course topics provide a comprehensive grounding in telecommunications policy; competition and antitrust; concentration, diversity and expression; intellectual property; standards and innovation; peer production and user innovation; information privacy; digital governance; and transnational information policy. The course also emphasizes the development of core information policy skills, introducing students to relevant analytic contributions from the fields of economics, communication, law, and public policy. Course Level: Graduate This Work, SI 507 / 703 - Information Policy Analysis and Design, by Steven J. Jackson is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike license.

SI 508 has been taught in various forms from 2006 to 2008 to master

As data collection and information networks expand (and stories of security breaches and the misuse of personal information abound), data security and privacy issues are increasingly central parts of the information policy landscape. Legislators, regulators, businesses, and other institutions of all kinds are under increasing pressure to draft and implement effective laws, regulations, and security and privacy programs under rapidly changing technological, business, and legal conditions. A strong need is arising for individuals with the training and skills to work in this unsettled and evolving environment. This course examines security issues related to the safeguarding of sensitive personal and corporate information against inadvertent disclosure; policy and societal questions concerning the value of security and privacy regulations, the real-world effects of data breaches on individuals and businesses, and the balancing of interests among individuals, government, and enterprises; current and proposed laws and regulations that govern data security and privacy; private-sector regulatory efforts and self-help measures; emerging technologies that may affect security and privacy concerns; and issues related to the development of enterprise data security programs, policies, and procedures that take into account the requirements of all relevant constituencies, e.g., technical, business, and legal. Course Level: Graduate This Work, SI 510 - Special Topics: Data Security and Privacy: Legal, Policy and Enterprise Issues, by Don Blumenthal is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike license.

This course introduces students to the ideas and practices surrounding teaching, learning and research at a world class research university like the University of Michigan, and the emerging role in these practices of Open Educational Resources, including open content such as opencourseware, open access initiatives, open publishing of research and learning materials as found in open journals, databases and e-prints, open textbooks, related open software efforts such as open learning systems, and emerging open teaching experiments. The course will ground the students in how teaching, learning and research is done at the university level, and then survey relevant OER efforts, looking at their history, development, potential futures, and the underlying motivations for their progressive adoption by various members of the community of scholars. more... This course uses an open textbook Open Educational Resources at the University of Michigan. The articles in the open textbook (wikibook) were written by the School of Information Graduate students in the class. Course Level: Graduate This Work, SI 521 - Special Topics: Open Educational Resources and the University of Michigan, by Joseph Hardin is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution license.

This course gives students a background in theory and practice surrounding online interaction environments. For the purpose of this course, a community is defined as a group of people who sustain interaction over time. The group may be held together by a common identity, a collective purpose, or merely by the individual utility gained from the interactions. An online interaction environment is an electronic forum, accessed through computers or other electronic devices, in which community members can conduct some or all of their interactions. The term eCommunity is used as shorthand, both for communities that conduct all of their interactions online and for communities that use online interaction to supplement face-to-face interactions. Two main threads weave through the course, based on the two main texts. One thread is concerned with the practical issues of design and use of online tools to support communities, and how choices that must be made in design can impact the function and style of the resulting community. The second thread focuses on the sociological theory that provides a frame to better understand communities in general. These theoretical pieces provide a lens for better understanding the implications of choices made on the more practical level. Course Level: Graduate This Work, SI 529 - eCommunities: Analysis and Design of Online Interaction Environments, by Paul Resnick is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution license.

Course is the first in a two-part sequence exploring contemporary practices, challenges, and opportunities at the intersection of information technology and democratic governance. Whereas the second course focuses on challenges and innovations in democratic administration, this first course focuses on theories and practices of democratic politics and the shifting role of information technologies in supporting, transforming, and understanding these. The first half of the course seeks to ground contemporary discussion around IT and politics in various flavors of democratic and political theory. The second half builds on this foundation to explore ways in which information and information technologies have come to support, constrain, and otherwise inflect a range of contemporary democratic practices. Course Level: Graduate This Work, SI 532 / SI 732 - Digital Government 1: Information Technology and Democratic Politics, by Steven J. Jackson is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike license.

This seminar provides students an opportunity to do in-depth research into an information policy topic of their interest. Students will gain an understanding of current United States Government Policy in areas involved with information and information technology. Policies are forming and changing daily. In order to keep up with these changes the class includes guest lecturers who are studying or actually creating policies in the information area. The first part of the course consists of the student selecting and defining a topic. The second part of the course involves the presentation and discussion of the topic. As an advanced graduate course there is an expectation that the final paper will be, with suitable editing, publishable in a journal. Course Level: Graduate This Work, SI 550 - Seminar on Information Policy, by Victor Rosenberg is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution license.

This is a standard course in "game theory," designed with the School of Information MSI students as the primary audience. This course is the pre-requisite for several ICD courses. To be well-prepared for management, policy and analysis in the information professions you need to first have a solid grounding in game theory and its applications to problem solving. Thus, the primary objective is to teach you a set of useful theories and how to apply them to solve problems. The emphasis is on method and application. Course Level: Graduate This Work, SI 563 - Game Theory, by Yan Chen is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial license.

This course brings together students and faculty who are engaged in diverse community and public interest work to hear from a wide range of fascinating guests and to engage in discussion around their expertise and experiences. Readings include those recommended by guests and a highly focused group of context-setting community informatics articles. Students learn the roots of community informatics

This Work, SI 615 - Seminar on Digital Libraries, by is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike license. This is a special topics seminar focusing on the current state of

This course provides an overview of the purposes and uses of outcome-based evaluation approaches and methods, and provides an opportunity to conduct a focused outcome evaluation of a user-focused service in a library, a nonprofit organization, an archive, a museum or other service-focused organization. Objectives are to: - Learn about approaches to outcome-based evaluation - Identify and use context-centered methods for evaluating public information services - Examine the role of evaluation in developing more effective information services - Gain skill in identifying appropriate data collection and analysis methods - Gain an understanding of recent developments in measurement and evaluation - Read assigned readings and appropriate focused readings - Plan and carry out a focused outcome-based evaluation project Course Level: Graduate This Work, SI 623 - Outcome-Based Evaluation of Programs and Services, by Joan C. Durrance is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike license.

Information practice demands knowledge of all aspects of management and service delivery. This course introduces selected theories, principles and techniques of contemporary management science, and organizational behavior and their application to libraries and information services. Students develop skills in planning, organizing, personnel management, financial management, leading, marketing, stakeholder management, and coordinating functions in libraries and information services. Students also have the opportunity to think critically about, and reflect upon, contemporary management practice in information organizations. Information professionals find that no matter whether they choose a career as a single entrepreneur, solo librarian, archivist, or whether they join a large organization, they become managers -- of themselves, of clients or staff, and sometimes of substantial systems and services. Course Level: Graduate This Work, SI 626 - Management of Libraries and Information Services, by Tiffany Veinot is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike license.

This course focuses on the current state of "digital libraries" from a multidisciplinary perspective. Its point of departure is the possibilities and prospects for convergence of professions and cultures around the notion of digital media and content. The course covers the history of the idea of the digital library and the digital archive, especially its manifestation as projects and programs in academic, nonprofit, and research settings, and the suite of policy issues that influence the development and growth of digital libraries and archives. A foundation of core archival principles as applied in digital library and archives settings serves as an intellectual construct supporting the exploration of the related concepts of scholarly communication, digital preservation, cyberinfrastructure, representation, and standards/best practices. Students are expected to master a diverse literature, to participate actively in the discussion of issues, and to take steps, collectively and individually, to advance our understanding of future directions of digital libraries and archives. Course Level: Graduate This Work, SI 640 - Digital Libraries and Archives, by Paul Conway is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike license.

This course provides an opportunity for students to examine information seeking and use in geographic communities. The course takes an interdisciplinary approach to explore: 1) selected community information needs & use situations (everyday life problem solving, community problem solving, citizenship, civic engagement and participation); 2) factors that influence community information use including the roles of community information organizations & institutions; 3) models of community information provision. The course starts with a brief historical introduction. Students will have opportunities to examine in more detail topics of especial interest to them. Course Level: Graduate This Work, SI 645 / SI 745 - Information Use in Communities, by Joan C. Durrance is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial license.

This course provides a strong grounding in the economics of information goods and services. Students analyze strategic issues faced by for-profit and not-for-profit organizations: pricing, bundling, versioning, product differentiation and variety, network externalities, and rights management. This course precedes SI 680. Course Level: Graduate This Work, SI 646 - Information Economics, by Mark McCabe is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike license.

Records are the corporate and cultural memory that provide proof of actions and decisions, build a knowledge-base for reflection and learning, and form a perspective on today's society that we will pass on to future generations. As organizations create and maintain more of their records electronically, they are struggling to develop effective policies, systems, and practices to capture, maintain, and preserve electronic records. This course examines the ways in which new information technologies challenge organizations' capacities to define, identify, control, manage, and preserve electronic records. Students learn how different organizational, technological, regulatory, and cultural factors affect the strategies, practices, and tools that organizations can employ to manage electronic records. Problems of long-term preservation and continuing access to electronic records are analyzed and addressed. Addresses electronic records management issues in a wide variety of settings, including archives and manuscript repositories. Course Level: Graduate This Work, SI 655 - Management of Electronic Records, by David A. Wallace, Margaret Hedstrom is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike license.