Here is the link for the final project registration form. Every group must fill this form to let us know about their project.

STATS60: Final Project

The project counts for 40% of your total grade, and has two components: a project proposal (worth 20% of the project grade) and a final project (worth 80% of the project grade). You may choose to do a project on your own or with up to two other teammates. (If working with a teammate, only one person has to submit the work. The names and SUNet IDs of both teams should be clearly labeled. Your final report should have a paragraph outlining the contributions of each member to the project.)

Both the project proposal and the final project must be submitted as a pdf file on Gradescope. If working with one or more teammate, only one person has to submit the work. The names and SUNet IDs of both teams should be clearly labeled. Your proposal should have a paragraph outlining the planned contributions of each member. For both submissions, the person who submits the assignment must make sure that all group members are added to the Gradescope submission. Here is a tutorial on how to do this: step 1 screenshot - step 2 screenshot.

Project Proposal (20%)

For the project proposal, submit a 1-2 paragraph description of your final project. You should provide details on the problem you wish to explore, any datasets that you will use, and potential visualizations. The proposal is a way for me to make sure that you have enough structure and data to complete the project. To get full credit, you should ensure that:

• The question is clearly stated
• The motivation for the question is clearly explained
• It is clear where the data came from and how it was obtained
• The variables in the data are correctly identified
• The planned cleaning and data wrangling process is clearly explained and it is appropriate
• There are at least two limitations explained and these limitations are logical.

In implementing your final project, you should try to stick as closely to your proposal as possible. If you are unable to do so, please provide a paragraph in your final project to explain the deviations from the proposal.

Here are some examples of student project proposals from previous runs of this class: [Example 1] - [Example 2]. These proposals did not necessarily get a perfect grade! You should always make sure to match the requirements outlined above in order to get full credit.

Final Project (80%)

To demonstrate your understanding of the material we have covered, you will perform a data analysis project in R.

Here are the project minimum requirements:

• .Rmd file, as well as 1 .html or .pdf file. (Don’t worry about what these file formats are and how to create them right now; we’ll talk about this later in the course.) Work with a dataset not used in class. Provide the data file and/or a link to it. My advice is to use a dataset that is in .csv or .txt format, as these will be easier to import into R.
• An “Introduction” section describing the problem and the datasets to be used. This should include top-level summaries of the data (e.g. how many observations and features, histogram/scatterplots of values, anything unusual).
• A “Data analysis” section where you have both code and accompanying text describing what the code is doing and interpreting the results. At least 3 data visualizations, each of a different type. (If working with a teammate, at least 6 data visualizations, with at least 3 different types.)
• A “Conclusion” section to summarize the results of the analysis, as well as any deviations from the project proposal.

While your analysis should not be too skimpy, it does not have to be comprehensive either. Take a look at the links below for examples of what the final project could look like, as well as ideas for datasets which you might want to work on.

Project Video Presentation (part of the Final Project grade)

The last lecture, on Friday August 14, will be dedicated to showcasing your work. You will take turns sharing your screen and presenting a slide deck of your work to the class. Each group will have 10 minutes. Your Final Project grade will be determined by the clarity and relevance of your presentation both written and video presented, as a whole. There is no exact grade breakdown between the written report and the video.

If no representative from your group can make it at the lecture time (due, for example, to time zone differences), your group is required to submit a 10-minute presentation video for their final project. Students can be as creative as they like for their video presentations. The easiest option might be to create a slide deck together as a team and record yourselves presenting the slide deck as a group using Zoom. You can then upload your video to the class Google Drive available at this link. You will need to login from your Stanford account (and not a personal Google account) to be able to upload. Your video upload should be clearly labeled in the format _student_names_project_title.Each student member should speak during the presentation. The deadline to submit the video is Friday August 14, 12PM PDT.

The following is a suggested structure for the video presentation. You don’t necessarily have to organize your presentation using these sections in this order, but that would likely be a good starting point for most projects.

• Problem Statement: Briefly describe the problem your group is tackling. Describe the overall motivation, as well as the input / output of the problem.
• Related Works [Optional]: Briefly in what ways previous works have tackled the technical challenges.
• Your Approach and Results: Describe your detailed technical approach and contributions. This is the meat of the presentation!
• Broader Impact: How do you expect the impact of your work to be? What can others learn from it or how can they apply it to solve their problems?
• Limitations: What are the limitations of your work? What are areas for future improvements?

Note: To preserve your privacy, this meeting will not be recorded or broadcast.

Grading and Deadlines

Both the project proposal and final project should be submitted through Gradescope.

• The project proposal is due by July 15 (Wed), 5PM Pacific Time and is worth 20%.
• The final project (and video recording if applicable) is due by August 14 (Fri), 12PM Pacific Time and is worth 80%.

For each late day, a multiplicative penalty factor of 0.8 will be applied. The final project cannot be submitted late. If you foresee that you may have difficulty meeting these deadlines, please come and speak with me immediately.

What might the final project look like?

Here are some examples of good student projects from previous runs of this class:

• World Happiness Analysis, Clementine Chou.
• Analysis of Chocolate Bars, William Chow.
• California Election Analysis, Kyle Dixon.
• Street Trees in San Francisco, CA, Jessica Eggers.
• An (Incomprehensive) Analysis of the College Scorecard Data, Alex Hurtado.
• Oregon Timber Harvest, Sierra Killian.
• Wine Project Report, Miranda Li.
• SAT Score Analysis, Angela Luo.
• San Francisco Airbnb Analysis, Jenny Nova.

I don’t really have ideas for what data to use…

The Resources tab has several suggestions for you.