Final Grades

Hi,

I am sorry I could not communicate very well over the past few days. I had a climbing accident and were hospitalized for sometime. I finished grading and submitted the grades just in time. Here I post all your grades from the semester.

For assignment two I did not punish anybody because of cheating (even though some people submitted exactly the same paper as some other students ). For assignments 3 and 4 I gave a grade of zero if the entire paper was the exact copy of some other student. At this point you should really know what CHEATING means.

Assignment 3 turned out to be quite difficult. So I graded them as follows. Anyone who gave me a paper which was a decent effort got 100. Poorer papers got 75 or 85. Some very poorly written papers got 50 just becasue you submitted something. A few papers were exact copies of one another and therefore writers of these papers gets a 0 for the assignment.

Paper 4 were better in general. I noticed a few copy-and paste cheats but the situation was not as bad as assignment 3. Only a couple of papers were direct copies from websites and they got 0 naturally.

Passing grade (DD) was 50. FD was 40-49, DC 60-64, CC 65-69, CB 70-74, BB 75-79, BA 80-89 and 90-100 AA.

If you were just at the border of two grades I upgrded. All rounding of grades were done in the student's favor.

Student ID	Section	ASG 1	ASG2	ASG3	ASG4	ATT	EXP	TOTAL
20110203004	1	60	75	100	85	12	0	72.75
20110203006	1	0	75	0	50	12	5	43.25
20110203016	1	65	90	100		15	5	58.25
20100203020	1		70	0	85	15	0	51
20120203057	1	65	70	0		15	0	35.25
20110203030	1	65	65	0	85	15	5	65
20100203028	1	30	70	0		12	5	32
20100203036	1			0		15	0	15
20110203037	1	0		0	10	10	0	13
20110203041	1	65	80	100	85	15	5	82.25
20110203057	1	65	85	0	50	10	5	52.5
20110203059	1		50	100		10	5	37.5
20110203060	1			0	50	10	0	25
20110203063	1		70	75	65	15	5	61.25
20110203111	1	50	65	0	50	12	5	49.25
20100203122	1	30	75	0	50	15	5	50.75
20110203067	1	75	70	0	85	12	5	64.25
20100203074	1	90	90	0	95	15	0	70.5
20110203076	1	85	90	100	90	12	5	85.25
20110203080	1	70	90	50	85	15	5	77
20110203087	1	75	80	100	90	17	5	87.25
20110203090	1	30	75	75		12	5	44
20110203088	1	90	95	100	85	15	0	83.25
20110203096	1	60	65	0	40	12	5	47.75
20110203011	2			100		12	0	27
20100203013	2	10	85	100	90	15	0	71.25
20110203025	2	85	95	0	20	15	5	46.25
20100203027	2		100	100		15	5	50
20110203032	2	0	75	0		12	0	23.25
20100203037	2	0	65	75		17	5	43
20100203038	2			0		10	0	10
20110203039	2	30	50	75	60	15	5	61.25
20110203045	2	80	80	80	90	10	5	78
20110203054	2	0		0		10	0	10
20110203055	2	100	99	100	100	20	5	99.85
20110203056	2	10	70	50	50	15	5	54.5
20110203065	2	65	80	75	0	15	5	53
20110203069	2		80	0	50	12	5	44
20110203078	2	75	92	0	70	15	5	66.05
20100203085	2		70	100	50	15	5	60.5
20110203089	2	95	90	50	90	15	5	82.25
20100203095	2	50	75	100		12	5	50.75
20110203001	3	90	95	100	95	20	5	96.25
20110203003	3	70	80	100	50	10	5	67.5
20100203109	3	30	85	100	75	12	5	71.75
20110203009	3	90	95	100	100	20	5	97.75
20110203012	3		95	0	85	15	5	59.75
20110203013	3		85	0		10	5	27.75
20120203012	3	65	98	100	90	15	5	86.45
20110203019	3	75	95	0	90	12	5	69.5
20110203017	3	85	92	75	50	12	0	64.8
20110203023	3	50	85	85	50	12	5	65
20110203026	3		80	100	85	15	5	72.5
20120203018	3		40	75		12	5	34.25
20110203036	3		65	0		10	5	24.75
20100203046	3		75	100	50	12	5	58.25
20110203049	3		90	100	90	15	5	75.5
20110203050	3			0		12	5	17
20120203055	3	50	75	100	70	20	5	79.75
20120203056	3	80	75	0	95	18	5	74.75
20110203073	3	50		0		12	5	24.5
20090203071	3		90	75	50	12	5	56.75
20110203081	3			0	0	10	0	10
20110203082	3		90	0	50	12	5	45.5
20110203093	3	65	90	0		10	5	38.25
20110203095	3	85	98	100	100	20	5	97.45

Assignment NO 4

This assignment is worth 30 percent of your grade. So try to complete it with very carefully. Here is how the grades will be given:

(15*3=45%) Assignments NO 1,2,and 3
(30%) Assignment NO 4
(20%) Attendance and Participation
(5%) Experiment/Survey Participation

(100%) Total

Experiment Survey participation will take place on 3 january 2013 in room C203. This experiment takes about 35-40 minutes and verybody who participate will get 5 percent. There are no right or wrong answers or any performance criteria. All surveys will be anonymous, so there is no need to worry about your identity.

I will be in room C203 From 9:00 until 13:00. You can come and take the survey anytime in this period. Do not come later than 13:00.

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OK Here is the last assignment. The deadline for submission is January 11, 17:00. NO LATE SUBMISSIONS WILL BE ACCEPTED. As always, PDF, WORD, or ODT formats. Send the assignment to eser.sekercioglu@gmail.com

ASSIGNMENT 4 RESEARCH TOPIC: Write a 1.5 - 2 page literature review using at least 5 academic soruces (articles or books) on the following research topic. (Remember that I do not want you to actually answer the question. Just find the resources that will help you answer it and discuss these resources. If you have ideas and thoughts you are welcome to add them to your review but this is not a term or research paper. My evaluation will be based on your ability to find, organize and discuss relevant articles.)

"Is the Clash of Civilizations idea proven correct after the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Center?" 

Assignment NO:4 Guidelines

Here is a step by step instruction sheet for assignment 4

1. First do a general search based on your topic. For example if the topic is "Role of ideology in 2007 election in Turkey" do not start with the whole topic. That would be too specific. Do not start with "ideology" or "Turkey", this would be so general that you would not know what to do with the results. Try something like "ideology and elections" or "2007 elections Turkey".
2. A good idea in preparing literature review is to look at what other researchers have done before. So, try to find an article on your topic. For example a general article about "ideology and elections". There are many articles that are called review articles which make a general discussion of the literature. If you find an article like that look at the literature review part of this article. Which articles did the authors use? Most probably they will have used the most important pieces. So you can select your articles for your review based on what others did before you.
3. Another good idea is to start with a look at Wikipedia.org. You should never use wikipedia as a formal referenece but it is a good place to start researching a topic. Just read the wikipedia topic and have a sense of which important articles to find in scholar.google.com.
4. These three steps will give you many possible articles. How are you going to choose which ones to use? Do not start reading the articles. That would be too many. Read the abstracts first. The abstracts are always available. If the abstract is promising, that is, if the articles seems to be about something you can use, just write down the author and the name of the article . You will find these articles later.
5. Select about 15-20 articles (just reading the abstracts). About 10 should be general and about 10 should be about more specific points about your research question.
6. Do not read the articles in whole yet. Just read the introductions. Introductions are just 2 pagas long at most and will definietly give you an idea about whether you can use this article.
7. Of your 20 or so articles, select 5 to 8 most relevant based on their introductions. These 5-8 articles will be used in your literature review.
8. This is what you should do when you read these articles.
• Read the introduction very carefully. Understand what the paper is all about.
• Do not spend too much time on theory, data, data analysis or methods sections. 
• Read the findings/inferences/results sections very carefully.
• If there are explicitly written hypotheses make sure to read them.
9. Once you have read these articles. Order them from more general to more specific. Then here is how you will construct your literature review.
• Start with a general discussion of the topic. Use the most general articles here. 
• Gradually add more specific details about your research question based on your search.
• Make sure that your literature review does not look like disconnected summaries of articles. Construct your review such that you discuss ideas and findings and just give references to papers rather than directly summarizing papers.
• After you discuss the topic add an introduction paragraph on top. You should not start by writing an introduction because you may not know what you will be writing exactly.
• And finish with a conclusion. Conclusion should be about your thoughts on this topic. What is your personal thoughts on this research idea? What do you think will be found if we actually research this field?
• So the lit review will look like:
• 1 Paragraph introduction
• 5-7 Paragraphs article discussions
• 1 paragraph conclusion
10. I am not very interested in how you put citations. Do not try too hard to be academic. Just copy the style of one of the papers you read. Just make sure that you give me a list of Articles you read (Author name, year of publication, title of article, name of the journal). Also copy and paste the abstract of the articles you used at the very end of your paper.

Assignment No 3 Deadline Extended

Deadline for the assignment no 3 is extended to Monday, December 24, 17:00

No Late Submissions

Assignment NO 3 Tips and Notes

IREU  Assignment 3 Article Review Guidelines

Deadline for submission: DECEMBER 21, FRIDAY 2012 17:00

Send to eser.sekercioglu@gmail.com  Open Office, WORD or PDF attachments only.

Assignment article and instructions can be found at:

http://www.data-ist.com/ireu150/Assignments/Assignment3.pdf

In this assignment you will combine what we have learned in the semester so far.

I will post a research article about Turkish Politics. You will read this article and write a 1.5 - 2 page review.

 

In a typical journal article authors argue several points and try to support them with data analyses, historical documents, or with logical reasoning. In the article I will give you for review most arguments will be based on empirical data. When you are writing an article review you have to think about the following points very carefully.

•  What is the research question? (I.e. What is the topic/subject of the article?)
•  What are the main arguments made in the article? (There can be several)
•   How are these arguments supported with evidence?
•   Is the support for the arguments convincing?
•   What is the importance/value of the article? (what did we learn from this article that we did not know before and how does this article help us understand the political world)

Since IREU 150 is a general introductory course in International Relations I do not expect you to be expert article reviewers. Therefore, I will limit the scope of the article review to more specific points.

Here are the points I want to see in the article review:

-          What is this article about? (2-3 sentences)

-          What are the arguments made in the article? For each argument:

o   What is the argument (1-2 sentences)

o   How is this argument supported by the authors (data, anecdotes, charts, etc.) (1-3 sentences)

o   Do you find this argument convincing? Why or why not? (Give your reasons for finding the argument convincing or not) (1-3 sentences)

-     Some arguments will be supported by graphs and/or charts. Evaluate these charts the same way we evaluated charts for the second assignment.

o   Are there any problems with the chart? (2 sentences)

o   If yes, how does the chart misguide or mislead the reader? (1-3 sentences)

o   How could it be corrected? (1-2 sentences)

-     What is your general evaluation of the article? Did you learn anything? Do you agree or disagree with the authors generally? Why or why not? (3-5 sentences)

Notes and Tips

-          In the article I assigned there are some statistical methods you are not familiar with. Do not be worried about these. Focus on what the authors infer (çıkarım yapmak) from these analyses. I am aware that you are not experts on statistical analyses. So, assume that all statistical work is correct. Focus on the message.

-          How do I know which argument is about which chart or graph? Usually the name or number of the chart is given in the text. For example you can see a sentence like:

“In figure 3, it can be seen that….”

“Figure 2 illustrates the point that….”

“The resulting map (Figure 1) displays a vivid picture of trends along the survival/ self-expression and traditional/secular-rational values for Turkey and some EU member states.”

-          This is a 20 or so page article. Unlike the assignment 1, when claims were just one sentence long, in a journal article arguments can be explained in several paragraphs. So, when you think you found an argument do not jump in and start writing. First make sure that you read the whole argument and exactly know what it is.

-           

-          You have 1 week to complete this assignment. First read the article one or two times before writing anything. Take short notes as you read the article. If you try to do this assignment on the last minute you will not understand the article and write a very poor review. Use your time wisely, and please do not wait until the last minute.

Assignment 2

Here is the second assignment. Remember the Deadline for submission is 7 December 2012 Friday 17:00. No late submissions, no late submissions, no late submissions

The address for the assignment is:

http://www.data-ist.com/ireu150/Assignments/Assignment2.pdf

For a very short intro to excel graphics

http://spreadsheets.about.com/od/excelcharts/ss/Chart_wiz_step.htm

For pie charts

http://spreadsheets.about.com/od/excelcharts/ss/90216piechart03.htm

For bar charts/graphs

http://spreadsheets.about.com/od/excelcharts/ss/bar_graph.htm

This is the official microsoft tutorial

http://office.microsoft.com/en-001/excel-help/charts-i-how-to-create-a-chart-RZ001105505.aspx

This is for line charts and scatterplots

http://office.microsoft.com/en-001/excel-help/creating-xy-scatter-and-line-charts-HA001054840.aspx

http://faculty.fuqua.duke.edu/~pecklund/ExcelReview/2001_Documents/2001XLScatterPlotMono.pdf

Assignment NO:1

Here are the two arguments for which you are going to write responses. Make sure that you read very carefully and understand each argument. Remember how we analyzed arguments in class:

• Find the assumption
• Discuss the strengths and weaknesses of the assumption. Remember, there is no right or wrong answers here. You can trust the assumption or not depending on your own interpretation.
• Discuss what happens if the assumption is wrong
• Find the warranted and unwarranted claims.
• Discuss what happens if unwarranted claims are incorrect and whether you have enough reason to be suspicious.
• Discuss what evidence you need to evaluate the argument, what evidence would prove this argument useless / wrong and what evidence would support the argument.
• Conclude with a general assessment of the argument.

TOPIC 1

According to the Worldbank statistics (Statistics yearbook, 2010) 50 wealthiest countries in the world are also among the most democratic. Apart from oil rich Arab countries all rich countries also tend to be democratic, respectful of human rights and freedom of speech. On the other hand, most of the poorer countries in the world, the so called third world, are also among the most authoritarian regimes including some dictatorships. In democratic countries some key indicators of human development such as life expectancy, education levels, violence against women are also better than non-democratic countries. These observations led some researchers to argue that there is a direct relationship between democracy and development. Therefore, the Worldbank and the United Nations should devote more resources promoting democracy in order to facilitate economic development in the world.

TOPIC 2

 "Several recent surveys indicate that home owners are increasingly eager to conserve energy. At the same time, manufacturers are now marketing many home appliances, such as refrigerators and air conditioners, that are almost twice as energy efficient as those sold a decade ago. Also, new technologies for better home insulation and passive solar heating are readily available to reduce the energy needed for home heating. Therefore, the total demand for electricity in our area will not increase—and may decline slightly. Since our three electric generating plants in operation for the past twenty years have always met our needs, construction of new generating plants will not be necessary."