Courses tagged with "Digital governance" (52)

Part 2 of the UC Berkeley Agile Development Using Ruby on Rails XSeries Program will teach you to use JavaScript to enhance applications and create more sophisticated apps by adding relationships between models within the Ruby on Rails framework. You will also learn about what happens after the apps are deployed to real users, including how to monitor performance, identify and fix common performance problems, and avoid compromising customer data. Finally, learners will see how to apply Agile techniques to enhance and refactor legacy code and practice app deployment to real users to monitor performance, identify and fix common performance problems, and avoid compromising customer data. 

Other topics covered in this software engineering course include:

• How to form, organize and manage small programming teams
• Introduction to design patterns: what they are and how to recognize opportunities to apply them
• Using Rails for more advanced features like third-party authentication and elegantly expressing design patterns that arise frequently in SaaS

There will be four homework assignments: two programming assignments, an open source assignment and one assignment about operations/deployment. There will also be several short quizzes. The videos and homework assignments used in this offering of the course were revised in October 2016.

We are surrounded by information, much of it numerical, and it is important to know how to make sense of it. Stat2x is an introduction to the fundamental concepts and methods of statistics, the science of drawing conclusions from data.

The course is the online equivalent of Statistics 2, a 15-week introductory course taken in Berkeley by about 1,000 students each year. Stat2x is divided into three 5-week components. Stat2.1x is the first of the three.

The focus of Stat2.1x is on descriptive statistics. The goal of descriptive statistics is to summarize and present numerical information in a manner that is illuminating and useful. The course will cover graphical as well as numerical summaries of data, starting with a single variable and progressing to the relation between two variables. Methods will be illustrated with data from a variety of areas in the sciences and humanities.

There will be no mindless memorization of formulas and methods. Throughout Stat2.1x, the emphasis will be on understanding the reasoning behind the calculations, the assumptions under which they are valid, and the correct interpretation of results.

FAQ

• What is the format of the class?
  • Instruction will be consist of brief lectures and exercises to check comprehension. Grades (Pass or Not Pass) will be decided based on a combination of scores on short assignments, quizzes, and a final exam.
• How much does it cost to take the course?
  • Nothing! The course is free.
• Will the text of the lectures be available?
  • Yes. All of our lectures will have transcripts synced to the videos.
• Do I need to watch the lectures live?
  • No. You can watch the lectures at your leisure.
• Can I contact the Instructor or Teaching Assistants?
  • Yes, but not directly. The discussion forums are the appropriate venue for questions about the course. The instructors will monitor the discussion forums and try to respond to the most important questions; in many cases response from other students and peers will be adequate and faster.
• Do I need any other materials to take the course?
  • If you have any questions about edX generally, please see the edX FAQ.

Quantum computation is a remarkable subject building on the great computational discovery that computers based on quantum mechanics are exponentially powerful. This course aims to make this cutting-edge material broadly accessible to undergraduate students, including computer science majors who do not have any prior exposure to quantum mechanics. The course starts with a simple introduction to the fundamental principles of quantum mechanics using the concepts of qubits (or quantum bits) and quantum gates. This treatment emphasizes the paradoxical nature of the subject, including entanglement, non-local correlations, the no-cloning theorem and quantum teleportation. The course covers the fundamentals of quantum algorithms, including the quantum fourier transform, period finding, Shor's quantum algorithm for factoring integers, as well as the prospects for quantum algorithms for NP-complete problems. It also discusses the basic ideas behind the experimental realization of quantum computers, including the prospects for adiabatic quantum optimization and the D-Wave controversy.

Before your course starts, try the new edX Demo where you can explore the fun, interactive learning environment and virtual labs. Learn more.

Do I need a textbook for this class?
No. Notes will be posted each week. If you wish to consult other references, a list of related textbooks and online resources will be provided.

What is the estimated effort for course?
About 5-12 hrs/week.

Why is the work load range so wide?
How long you spend on the course depends upon your background and on the depth to which you wish to understand the material. The topics in this course are quite open ended, and will be presented so you can understand them at a high level or can try to follow it at a sophisticated level with the help of the posted notes.

How much does it cost to take the course?
Nothing! The course is free.

Will the text of the lectures be available?
Yes. All of our lectures will have transcripts synced to the videos.

Do I need to watch the lectures live?
No. You can watch the lectures at your leisure.

Statistics 2 at Berkeley is an introductory class taken by about 1000 students each year. Stat2.2x is the second of three five-week courses that make up Stat2x, the online equivalent of Berkeley's Stat 2.

The focus of Stat2.2x is on probability theory: exactly what is a random sample, and how does randomness work? If you buy 10 lottery tickets instead of 1, does your chance of winning go up by a factor of 10? What is the law of averages? How can polls make accurate predictions based on data from small fractions of the population? What should you expect to happen "just by chance"? These are some of the questions we will address in the course.

We will start with exact calculations of chances when the experiments are small enough that exact calculations are feasible and interesting. Then we will step back from all the details and try to identify features of large random samples that will help us approximate probabilities that are hard to compute exactly. We will study sums and averages of large random samples, discuss the factors that affect their accuracy, and use the normal approximation for their probability distributions.

Be warned: by the end of Stat2.2x you will not want to gamble. Ever. (Unless you're really good at counting cards, in which case you could try blackjack, but perhaps after taking all these edX courses you'll find other ways of earning money.)

The fundamental approach of the series was provided in the description of Stat2.1x and appears here again: There will be no mindless memorization of formulas and methods. Throughout the course, the emphasis will be on understanding the reasoning behind the calculations, the assumptions under which they are valid, and the correct interpretation of results.

FAQ

• What is the format of the class?
  • Instruction will be consist of brief lectures and exercises to check comprehension. Grades (Pass or Not Pass) will be decided based on a combination of scores on short assignments, quizzes, and a final exam.
• How much does it cost to take the course?
  • Nothing! The course is free.
• Will the text of the lectures be available?
  • Yes. All of our lectures will have transcripts synced to the videos.
• Do I need to watch the lectures live?
  • No. You can watch the lectures at your leisure.
• Will certificates be awarded?
  • Yes. Online learners who achieve a passing grade in a course can earn a certificate of achievement. These certificates will indicate you have successfully completed the course, but will not include a specific grade. Certificates will be issued by edX under the name of BerkeleyX, designating the institution from which the course originated.
• Can I contact the Instructor or Teaching Assistants?
  • Yes, but not directly. The discussion forums are the appropriate venue for questions about the course. The instructors will monitor the discussion forums and try to respond to the most important questions; in many cases response from other students and peers will be adequate and faster.
• Do I need any other materials to take the course?
  • If you have any questions about edX generally, please see the edX FAQ.

EECS149.1x introduces students to the design and analysis of computational systems that are integrated with physical processes.

"A free eight-week Science of Happiness course that will offer practical, research-backed tips on living a happy and meaningful life."  - The Huffington Post

We all want to be happy, and there are countless ideas about what happiness is and how we can get some. But not many of those ideas are based on science. That’s where this course comes in.

“The Science of Happiness” is the first MOOC to teach the ground-breaking science of positive psychology, which explores the roots of a happy and meaningful life. Students will engage with some of the most provocative and practical lessons from this science, discovering how cutting-edge research can be applied to their own lives. Created by UC Berkeley’s Greater Good Science Center, the course will zero in on a fundamental finding from positive psychology: that happiness is inextricably linked to having strong social connections and contributing to something bigger than yourself—the greater good. Students will learn about the cross-disciplinary research supporting this view, spanning the fields of psychology, neuroscience, evolutionary biology, and beyond.

What’s more, “The Science of Happiness” offers students practical strategies for tapping into and nurturing their own happiness, including trying several research-backed activities that foster social and emotional well-being, and exploring how their own happiness changes along the way.

The course’s co-instructors, Dacher Keltner and Emiliana Simon-Thomas, are not only leading authorities on positive psychology but also gifted teachers skilled at making science fun and personal. They’ll be joined by world-renowned experts discussing themes like empathy, mindfulness, and gratitude—experts including Barbara Fredrickson, Paul Ekman, Sonja Lyubomirsky, and Jon Kabat-Zinn. Health professionals who register can earn continuing education units for their participation.

Consider signing up for this course with a friend or group - tweet about your registration, share it on Facebook, and use the buddy system to stay on track. Join the conversation on The Greater Good Science Center Facebook page, or in the BerkeleyX: GG101x The Science of Happiness Facebook group.

This literature course will explore in depth Mark Twain’s 1884  novel, Huckleberry Finn, which has an important place in American literature and history. This novel is among the first in major American literature to be written in dialect, characterized by regional Southern English. While this makes the writing difficult to understand at first, it also gives us a window into the language of the time.

The story is noted for its colorful descriptions of people and places along the Mississippi River. Set in the American South after the Civil War, this book features a society that has ceased to exist about twenty years prior. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn is often described as a satire on deep-rooted attitudes, particularly racism, in the South.
 
Participants in this course will read, discuss, and write about the text and its influence. As in most book clubs, the focus will be on lively discussion. Course materials will include background information for understanding the text, as well as vocabulary and language support. Assessment will include quizzes and short writing assignments.
 
This is the second part of the BerkeleyX Book Club offerings.

Organizations use their data for decision support and to build data-intensive products and services, such as recommendation, prediction, and diagnostic systems. The collection of skills required by organizations to support these functions has been grouped under the term Data Science. This course will attempt to articulate the expected output of Data Scientists and then teach students how to use PySpark (part of Apache Spark) to deliver against these expectations. The course assignments include Log Mining, Textual Entity Recognition, Collaborative Filtering exercises that teach students how to manipulate data sets using parallel processing with PySpark.

This course covers advanced undergraduate-level material. It requires a programming background and experience with Python (or the ability to learn it quickly). All exercises will use PySpark (part of Apache Spark), but previous experience with Spark or distributed computing is NOT required. Students should take this Python mini-quiz before the course and take this Python mini-course if they need to learn Python or refresh their Python knowledge.
 

This literature course will examine James Joyce’s collection of fifteen short stories called simply Dubliners. This volume was first published in 1914, but not without a struggle. Joyce first submitted these stories to a publisher in 1905, and had it rejected 17 times before it was finally published in 1914. It has become one of the classics of English language literature, despite its rocky beginnings.

Dubliners depicts middle class Irish life in the early part of the 20th century. The first stories are narrated by protagonists who are children. As the stories continue, they examine the lives of characters in increasingly older stages of life. Interestingly, many of the characters who appear in these short stories appear later in minor roles in Joyce’s famous novel Ulysses.
 
Participants in this course will read, discuss, and write about the text and its influence. As in most book clubs, the focus will be on lively discussion. Course materials will include background information for understanding the text, as well as vocabulary and language support. Assessment will include quizzes and short writing assignments.
 
This is the fifth part of the BerkeleyX Book Club offerings.

This course will explore Bram Stoker’s 1897 classic vampire novel, Dracula, which is famous for introducing the vampire Count Dracula. This is the story of Dracula's move from Transylvania to England to find new blood and spread the curse of the undead. It also introduces the now-famous character of Professor Abraham Van Helsing.

The novel Dracula is categorized in many different ways: vampire, horror, and gothic fiction. It also addresses concepts such as women in Victorian culture, colonialism, sexuality, and post-colonialism. Although Stoker was not the first writer to tell the story of a vampire, he is credited for giving the vampire its modern form. This story has been adapted to many different forms in film and theater.

Participants in this course will read, discuss, and write about the text and its influence. As in most book clubs, the focus will be on lively discussion. Course materials will include background information for understanding the text, as well as vocabulary and language support. Assessment will include quizzes and short writing assignments.

This course will explore Upton Sinclair’s 1906 novel The Jungle, which portrays the exploitation of immigrants in the industrial USA of the early 20^th century. However, this novel is most remembered for its depiction of health violations and unclean conditions in the American meatpacking industry.

These findings were based on an investigation Sinclair did as a journalist..  Sinclair spent several weeks gathering information while working in the meatpacking plants of the Chicago stockyards for the newspaper Appeal to Reason. The Jungle was first published in serial form in 1905 in the newspaper. A film version of the novel was made in 1914, but it has been lost.

The novel highlights working class poverty, the lack of social support, harsh living and working conditions, and a bleak outlook for the working poor. This is contrasted with the corruption of those in power.

Participants in this course will read, discuss, and write about the text and its influence. As in most book clubs, the focus will be on lively discussion. Course materials will include background information for understanding the text, as well as vocabulary and language support. Assessment will include quizzes and short writing assignments.

Discover the big ideas and thinking practices in computer science plus learn how to code using one of the friendliest programming languages, Snap! (based on Scratch)

Computing has profoundly changed the world, opening up wonderful new ways for people to connect, design, research, play, create, and express themselves. However, just using a computer is only a small part of the picture. The real transformative and empowering experience comes when one learns how to program the computer, to translate ideas into code.

This course teaches students how to do exactly that, using Snap! (based on Scratch), one of the friendliest programming languages ever invented. It's purely graphical, which means programming involves simply dragging blocks around, and building bigger blocks out of smaller blocks. But this course is far more than just learning to program. We focus on seven big ideas (creativity, abstraction, data and information, algorithms, programming, the Internet, and global impact), and six computational thinking practices (connecting computing, creating computational artifacts, abstracting, analyzing problems and artifacts, communicating, and collaborating). Throughout the course, relevance is emphasized: relevance to the student and to society. This fun, introductory course is not just for computer science majors, it’s for everyone… join us!

“I am so grateful to have experienced BJC (Beauty and Joy of Computing). I took this course during my freshmen year at UC Berkeley, and it has actually changed my life. Because of it, I have switched to the computer science major and have even developed a passion for computer science education! This course showed me that computer science is creative, and it gave me the confidence to continue taking computer science courses. BJC's philosophy of inclusion, diversity, and collaboration is tangible and sets it apart from all other computer science courses that I have experienced. It is truly empowering!” -- Yifat Amir

Learn more about our High School and AP* Exam Preparation Courses

Science plays a crucial role in your decisions as you go about your daily life. The representatives you elect and the legislation you vote on influences science legislation, limits and funding. This class will teach you fundamentals of modern biology to help you make more informed voting decisions.

As you learn the fundamentals of Biology, we'll explore the scientific issues sparking political debate: 

• Evolution vs. creationism
• Reactions to pandemic disease
• The risks and benefits of vaccination 
• How extinctions impact the planet
• Space exploration and the search for extraterrestrial life
• Sexual behavior

We look forward to engaging course discussions about how each vote in a democracy affects the way biology functions in your everyday life.

Level Up! covers the complete Advanced Placement* Computer Science A course in unique and engaging ways. It's a significant change of pace from other online introductory programming courses. While you will rigorously learn the art of programming in Java, you will spend much of your time designing and writing games and simulations.  This course has no textbook because all the materials are online.  You’ll be reading; checking your understanding with self-tests; analyzing, modifying, and debugging code as well as writing it; and working with your fellow students to come to common understandings.  You’ll work with sounds and pictures (what do you sound like speaking backwards?), write adventure games and “smart” board games, and spend time trying to understand whole programs rather than just little pieces.
 
We’ve designed this course to help high-school students prepare for the Advanced Placement Computer Science test, and we’ll cover everything you need to know. It has been successfully used in classrooms for several years, and now its available for anyone, in school or not, through EdX. If you are an adult or a student who isn’t going to take the AP test, you are more than welcome to join!; We go beyond the minimum required by the AP committee, introducing graphics, mouse commands, and other tools for real programmers.
 
We based this course on the principles of “lab-centric” instruction, in which lectures are replaced by hands-on activities.  We won’t include long, fact-filled videos, and the webpages in this course will be your “textbook.”

Learn more about our High School and AP* Exam Preparation Courses

* Advanced Placement and AP are registered trademarks of the College Board, which was not involved in the production of, and does not endorse, these offerings.

Level Up! covers the complete Advanced Placement* Computer Science A course in unique and engaging ways. It's a significant change of pace from other online introductory programming courses. While you will rigorously learn the art of programming in Java, you will spend much of your time designing and writing games and simulations.  This course has no textbook because all the materials are online.  You’ll be reading; checking your understanding with self-tests; analyzing, modifying, and debugging code as well as writing it; and working with your fellow students to come to common understandings.  You’ll work with sounds and pictures (what do you sound like speaking backwards?), write adventure games and “smart” board games, and spend time trying to understand whole programs rather than just little pieces.

We’ve designed this course to help high-school students prepare for the Advanced Placement Computer Science test, and we’ll cover everything you need to know. It has been successfully used in classrooms for several years, and now its available for anyone, in school or not, through EdX. If you are an adult or a student who isn’t going to take the AP test, you are more than welcome to join!  We go beyond the minimum required by the AP committee, introducing graphics, mouse commands, and other tools for real programmers.

We based this course on the principles of “lab-centric” instruction, in which lectures are replaced by hands-on activities.  We won’t include long, fact-filled videos, and the webpages in this course will be your “textbook”.

Learn more about our High School and AP* Exam Preparation Courses

* Advanced Placement and AP are registered trademarks of the College Board, which was not involved in the production of, and does not endorse, these offerings.

This literature course will explore A Study in Scarlet, an 1887 detective mystery novel by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. This novel introduced the iconic Sherlock Holmes and his friend Dr. John Watson. The book's title comes from a speech Holmes gives to Doctor Watson about his work, saying: "There's the scarlet thread of murder running through the colourless skein of life, and our duty is to unravel it, and isolate it, and expose every inch of it."

The story received little very public interest when it first appeared. In fact, only eleven complete copies of Beeton's Christmas Annual 1887 are known to exist. Many adaptations of Sherlock Holmes exist, however, and he continues to fascinate readers as an enigmatic detective.

Participants in this course will read, discuss, and write about the text and its influence. As in most book clubs, the focus will be on lively discussion. Course materials will include background information for understanding the text, as well as vocabulary and language support. Assessment will include quizzes and short writing assignments.

The Beauty and Joy of Computing (BJC) is a computer science principles course developed at the University of California, Berkeley, intended to broaden participation in computing to non-traditional groups. Computing has profoundly changed the world, opening up wonderful new ways for people to connect, design, research, play, create, and express themselves. However, just using a computer is only a small part of the picture. The real transformative and empowering experience comes when one learns how to program the computer, to translate ideas into code.

This course teaches students how to do exactly that, using Snap! (based on Scratch), one of the friendliest programming languages ever invented. It's purely graphical, which means programming involves simply dragging blocks around, and building bigger blocks out of smaller blocks. But this course is far more than just learning to program. We focus on seven big ideas (creativity, abstraction, data and information, algorithms, programming, the Internet, and global impact), and six computational thinking practices (connecting computing, creating computational artifacts, abstracting, analyzing problems and artifacts, communicating, and collaborating). Throughout the course, relevance is emphasized: relevance to the student and to society. This fun, introductory course is not just for computer science majors, it’s for everyone… join us!

Learn more about our High School and AP Courses

This course will explore Jane Austen’s 1813 novel of manners,  Pride and Prejudice. Although the story of the Bennet sisters takes place at the turn of the 19th century, it still fascinates modern readers. One of the most popular books in the English language, Pride and Prejudice consistently placing near the top of lists of "most loved books." Modern interest in the book has resulted in a number of adaptations for film and stage--since 1940, there have been four TV and movie versions of this book, as well as a plethora of spin-off books, including Bridget Jones' Diary and Pride and Prejudice and Zombies.

Participants in this course will read, discuss, and write about the text and its influence. As in most book clubs, the focus will be on lively discussion. Course materials will include background information for understanding the text, as well as vocabulary and language support. Assessment will include quizzes and short writing assignments.

This course will explore in depth Charles Dickens’ 1843 novella, “A Christmas Carol,” which has an important place in English language literature. It has given us enduring characters, such as Scrooge and Tiny Tim, and common sayings, like “Bah! Humbug!”. Whether you celebrate Christmas or not, you will find that this book offers important themes, including generosity, poverty, and social injustice.
 
Participants in this course will read, discuss, and write about the text and its influence. As in most book clubs, the focus will be on lively discussion. Course materials will include background information for understanding the text, as well as vocabulary and language support. Assessment will include quizzes and short writing assignments.
 
This is the first part of the BerkeleyX Book Club offerings.

The Beauty and Joy of Computing (BJC) is a computer science principles course developed at the University of California, Berkeley, intended to broaden participation in computing to non-traditional groups. Computing has profoundly changed the world, opening up wonderful new ways for people to connect, design, research, play, create, and express themselves. However, just using a computer is only a small part of the picture. The real transformative and empowering experience comes when one learns how to program the computer, to translate ideas into code.

This course teaches students how to do exactly that, using Snap! (based on Scratch), one of the friendliest programming languages ever invented. It's purely graphical, which means programming involves simply dragging blocks around, and building bigger blocks out of smaller blocks. But this course is far more than just learning to program. We focus on seven big ideas (creativity, abstraction, data and information, algorithms, programming, the Internet, and global impact), and six computational thinking practices (connecting computing, creating computational artifacts, abstracting, analyzing problems and artifacts, communicating, and collaborating). Throughout the course, relevance is emphasized: relevance to the student and to society. This fun, introductory course is not just for computer science majors, it’s for everyone… join us!

Learn more about our High School and AP* Exam Preparation Courses