As you already know, part of your grading scheme is Project. I am going to give you some details about the project now.

While I believe that the most important lesson in a linear algebra course is "we have a set with some extra structure, we study that structure (maps, subsets etc respecting the structure)", I also believe that linear algebra is actually a useful tool. We teach our classes in a certain way but naturally when you see linear algebra in the wild it looks different. Nobody approaches you and asks "hey, wanna compute the kernel of this rank one map?" The purpose of this project is for you to explore what linear algebra looks like in applications.

<aside> 📢 You will choose a topic you enjoy and learn how linear algebra is used there. Previously, students have done topics including basketball, music, real estate, machine learning, medical imaging, space engineering and many many more.

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In this course, there is a lot of group work as you have noticed. Graded group chats, blogs and this project. However, the affect of your group members on your own grade is really minimal as you witness from the blogs for example. If you complete your part, you are not going to be penalised if someone else doesn't. Working with other people is cool, it makes things easier and sometimes you need to learn how to do that. This is the purpose of group works in this course. So that you can learn better. I am not trying to torture you.

<aside> 📢 For the project, you do not have to work with all your group members. You can divide your group into subgroups of any size you want. You can submit one project as a group or you can do it individually. Your choice. Just let me know.

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It is also possible that one person does it individually and the rest of the group does it together. It is also possible that you divide your group into four subgroups. Anything works.

Now, there are some details. You will see in the course calendar that there are some Project checks.

Project Check 1: Ignore this deadline on the calendar. You will start from project check 2.

Project Check 2: You will decide on who you want to do the project with. Submit via Teams a 2-3 page essay on who you are, what topics you are interested in (there can and should be multiple) and why you are interested in them.

<aside> 📢 When I say essay, I do not mean that you have to obey certain whatever standards. You do not have to ask "font size, double space, single space, reference style" etc. Write nicely, creatively and understandably. If you feel creative and you want to write 6 pages of a short story about linear algebra, do it.

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Project Check 3: You will decide on the topic you want to work on. You will search peer reviewed articles on the topic. The articles should be peer reviewed and should contain some linear algebra. You will pick multiple articles. You do not need to read them carefully or understand. You will write a one or two paragraph summary for all of them including name of the article, the journal, the authors, the year, what the article is about and how the linear algebra is used. This should be 2-3 pages as well.

<aside> 📢 The papers do not have to be "linear algebra" papers. It is okay if they use only some ideas and tools from linear algebra. Maybe a matrix, maybe a linear map, maybe some dimension theory etc.

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Project Check 4: You will choose one of the papers (or two if they are related) and write an extended 2-3 page summary. Focus on linear algebra used in the article.

The project: Building on the work you have done, you will write an essay. It should contain some paragraphs about who you are, the topic you choose, the reason for the topic, then extend your work on the long summary from Project Check 4. Conclude with your thoughts on the project: what have you learned, was it useful, what made you think "oh cool" etc.

The end.

If you have any questions, I'm happy to answer.