Course Guide

MS&E 299 Designing a Free Society

Course Information
Professor:
Prof. Ron Howard
rhoward@stanford.edu
Terman 418
(650) 723-4176

Course Assistant: 
Ibrahim Almojel
mojel@stanford.edu
Terman 406A
(650) 723-1467

Office Hours: After class or by appointment
Class Meetings: T-Th, 2:15 to 3:45 p.m. in Terman 453
Special Presentations: Tue 5:15-7:05 PM Thornton 110 (not every week, TBA)

Credits and Assignments
You can take MS&E 299 for 0, 1, 2, or 3 units depending on your involvement. Along with attending class meetings, critiquing subject articles, and taking part in general discussions, you will participate through reaction papers, term papers, class presentations, and other creative endeavors.

Critiquing Articles will be required from all students. You will be asked to critique three articles, and review three others, from the course reader throughout the quarter.

Reaction papers should be 2-3 pages, responding to arguments presented in the discussion, applying the Maxim to a particular issue, etc.

Term papers are longer (8-10 pages) and more formal treatments of topics drawn from the themes of the course.

Presentations provide opportunities to hold the floor for 40 minutes and guide the discussion toward a topic of personal interest. We will schedule presentations later in the quarter. You should meet with Christopher to discuss proposed presentation. You must sign up by January 24th as there will be limited presentation slots.

Business Plans The development of a business idea related to an idea in the class. Must be approved by the teaching team.

Reviews Students must review an equivalent of the unit requirements they have. You must review assignments that have not been reviewed before. This is done on a first come first served basis so if another person submits a review on an assignment, your review will not satisfy your requirement. You can review more assignments of you wish, the additional reviews can be done for previously reviewed assignments.

Other creative endeavors must meet with the teaching team’s approval.

Reaction papers count as 1⁄3 unit assignments, while others count as 1 unit assignments.

Class requirements are very flexible and simple – if you are enrolled in the class for n units, all we ask is that the weights of the assignments you turn in sum up to n units.

Typical course expectations (in addition to full attendance):
All students: Class-participation, paper critique
1 unit: for example: 3 reaction papers
2 units: for example: 3 reaction papers and a presentation
3 units: for example: a business plan, a presentation, and a term paper

All assignments must be posted on coursework. No paper submissions will be accepted.

Schedule
The units’ requirements must be satisfied according to the following schedule

• January 29th: First Critique, First Unit (students with 3 units)
• February 5th: Review of First Critique, First Review (students with 3 units)
• February 12th: Second Critique, Second Unit (students with 3 units), First Unit (students with 1-2 units)
• February 19th: Review of Second Critique, Second Review (students with 3 units), First Review (students with 1-2 units)
• February 26th: Third Critique, Third Unit (students with 3 units), Second Unit (students with 2 units)
• March 4th: Review of Third Critique, Third Review (students with 3 units), Second Review (students with 2 units

Grading
As a way to foster and prolong class discussions, your assignments will be reviewed and graded by your peers. More specifically:
- Presentations: Evaluation forms will be provided so that other students can assess the contribution of a presentation to the topics discussed in class;
- Papers and business plans: Every time you turn in a paper or business plan another student will review the work. The reviewer will then have one week to carefully read fellow student’s work and annotate it with constructive comments (objections, examples which support the same point or take the argument one step further, caveats, etc.). The reviewer should then upload the paper on coursework, along with an evaluation form, so that the author can read the reviewer’s comments and to them if he/she wishes.
- Attendance: Students are required to attend all the lectures. If you have a conflict, do contact the TA. In terms of final letter grades, MS&E 299 has traditionally let students grade themselves. We intend to follow this tradition with one caveat: you must show excellent performance in all your work, and attend all the classes. If you do so, you will turn in a self-evaluation at the end of the quarter specifying your grade and the criteria by which you arrived at the grade. We reserve the right to adjust your grade up or down if we feel your self evaluation is not adequate with respect to your performance in the class.

Reaction Papers
State your topic in a concise way near the beginning. For example, "When X said Y in the discussion, I disagreed. I think Z instead." "I have found difficulties applying the Maxim to situation X." "I have applied the Maxim to policy X and have come to the following conclusions: ..."

Keep them between two and three pages. Do substantial analysis. If you disagree with a method or policy prescribed by the Maxim, put thought into what exactly you disagree with and possible ways to resolve your disagreement (for example, what private institutions might come into being to solve the problem?). If you have come up with a new way to solve a problem using the Maxim, describe it well, give examples, and think about possible problems with it.

Ask someone to proofread your papers if you have problems with writing or have difficulty writing in English.

Term Papers
Follow the guidelines for reaction papers. The analysis should cover more ground. Discuss your ideas for your term paper with the TA before you start writing.

Presentations
For the presentation you can either talk about some topic that interests you or invite a guest speaker to speak to the class. These invited speakers could be members of the community: police, teachers, entrepreneurs, social workers, etc. Make sure to prepare speakers by explaining the purpose, format, and content of the class, and make sure that the topic relates to the course.

Feel free to work with a partner and make a joint presentation. This can help in coming up with a topic, finding possible speakers, and making the presentation.

Excellent presentations foster lively class discussion. Professor Howard can tell about the time when speakers from the pro-life movement, the pro-choice movement, and the Hemlock Society all gave presentations on the same day.

Paper Critique
We will provide more information during the class.