CS2013-final-report

eScience, University of North Carolina at Charlotte
Mirsad Hadzikadic and Carlos E. Seminario
mirsad@uncc.edu cseminar@uncc.edu
Knowledge Areas that contain topics and learning outcomes covered in the course
Knowledge Area
Total Hours of Coverage
Computational Science (CN) 42
Intelligent Systems (IS) 15
Topics outside Body of Knowledge 33
Where does the course fit in your curriculum
The University of North Carolina at Charlotte’s (UNCC) College of Computing and Informatics (CCI) has recently
introduced its first laboratory-based science course, designed to partially satisfy the science portion of the University
College’s general education requirements 2 3 . The University College General Education program’s curriculum
reflects UNCC’s commitment to the principles of a liberal arts education, a broad training that develops analytic,
problem solving, and communications skills and also awareness of bodies of knowledge and new perspectives that
prepare students for success in their careers and communities in the 21st century. In the General Education
curriculum, eScience is positioned alongside other introductory “Inquiry into the Sciences” courses 4 such as
Astronomy, Bioinformatics, Biological Anthropology, Biology, Chemistry, Earth Sciences, Geology, Physics, and
Psychology.
This course is commonly taken by freshmen and sophomores, occasionally juniors and seniors have attended.
Although this course is not compulsory, it does satisfy the requirement for a science class with lab. There are no
course pre-requisites and no follow-on courses are required. (Starting in the Fall 2013, a related and optional Agent-
Based Modeling course will be offered for undergraduate and graduate students.) Typically, anywhere from 15 to 40
students will take this course per semester.
What is covered in the course
eScience’s basic premise is that in addition to the two accepted scientific inquiry methods: theoretical/mathematical
formulation and experimentation, computational simulation/modeling has become the third method for doing
science. eScience introduces the application of computational methods to scientific exploration and discovery in the
social and natural sciences. Both the class and the laboratory include a broad range of well-defined experiments,
verified data inputs, predictable/repeatable outcomes, and open questions to be explored. We begin with an
Introduction to eScience, Scientific Method, and Models. Thereafter, we have weekly topics including Spread of
Epidemics, Spread of Fire, Movement of Ants and Problem Solving, Predator-prey relationships,
2 http://ucol.uncc.edu/
3 http://ucol.uncc.edu/gened/requirements.htm
4 https://ucol.uncc.edu/general-education/requirements/inquiry-sciences
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