Instructions for Term Paper Proposals

Hints and Tips for Term Paper Proposals

  1. Take a look at the term papers from the previous cohorts. They will give an idea about the depth and breadth of a reasonable term paper.
  2. Treat your proposal as a very early draft of your term paper.
  3. Use past tense, as if you have already completed your term paper, since you will have to use past tense for your final paper.

Presenting Your Proposal

Your team will present the proposal during class. The main objective of the presentation is to explain the key points of the proposal and to receive feedback on it from your classmates and the teaching staff. Additional details about proposal presentations:

  • The teaching staff will announce one week in advance the amount of time that teams will have for presenting their proposals. Usually, it’s between 5 and 10 minutes.
  • You can choose any means and ways of presenting. While no mark will be given for presenting the proposal, your objective is to clearly explain answers to the same questions as the ones your submitted proposal will answer (see below for the questions).
  • Anyone from your team can present the proposal. Solo and group presentations are allowed.
  • In case of presenting online, feel free to share your screen.

Submitting Your Proposal

You are to submit a one or two-page written proposal for the term paper with an initial bibliography. Only first two pages will be read by the teaching staff. Bibliographic references don’t count towards the page limit. The due date is on the course site of Canvas. It is advisable to get going early; teaching staff will gladly accept proposals before the deadline. This assignment gives the teaching stuff a chance to review and approve your paper proposal, and to suggest corrections or improvements.

Attention: Submit your paper proposal only in PDF. Proposals in any other formats will be discarded. Only first two pages will be read. Spelling, grammar, and other language errors will result in fewer points credited to the proposal. Format your proposal and references in the term paper proposal format (word, latex).

You are also encouraged to discuss what you want to do for the term paper with the course instructor during his office hours.

The following are the questions that your term paper proposal should address in brief:

For a design paper:

  1. What is the problem we are going to address?
  2. Why is this problem important?
  3. How is this problem currently addressed by others?
  4. What is the way we are proposing to address the problem?
  5. Why and in what respect is our way to address this problem is going to be better than those developed by others?
  6. How are you going to evaluate your proposal?
  7. What is our plan for completing the term paper and submitting it by the deadline (see the course calendar)?

For an analysis paper:

  1. What is the system that is going to be analyzed?
  2. Why is the security analysis of these systems important? (Explain it in terms of the value of the assets, threats, and risks).
  3. Who else did perform similar analysis or analyzed similar systems? (i.e., related work summary)
  4. What is the methodology of your analysis? Explain here exactly how you will be analyzing the system/solution.
  5. Make sure to include in your submitted proposal the analysis authorization form signed by all the required parties. If the system owner or the course professor did not provide signatures, include corresponding e-mail messages from them.
  6. Why will the world be a better place after your analysis? That is, how is your analysis going to be beneficial to the society?
  7. What is our plan for completing the analysis and submitting the report by the deadline (see the course calendar)?

For an implementation paper:

  1. What is the system for which we will be implementing a new function/feature?
  2. What is the function/feature we are going to implement?
  3. Why is this function/feature important in the context of the overall system?
  4. What is the way we are proposing to implement this function/feature?
  5. What’s the evidence that the system owner/developer is interested in incorporating our implementation in the system?
  6. What is our plan for completing the term paper and submitting it by the deadline (see the course calendar)?

For a survey paper:

  1. What is the problem/phenomena/technology/scheme(s) that is going to be surveyed?
  2. Why is a survey of it important? Why will the world be a better place after your survey? That is, how is your survey going to be beneficial to the society?
  3. Who else did perform similar surveys of this or similar problem/phenomena/technology/scheme(s)? And, how will your term paper be similar to and different from the existing surveys?
  4. What have you found published in academic literature on this topic? As a rule of thumb, you should find at least 20 different publications in academic venues BEFORE the proposal deadline and include their list in your proposal.
  5. What is the methodology of the data collection and analysis for your survey? Explain here exactly how you will proceed with identifying relevant publications and analyzing them.
  6. What is our plan for completing the survey and submitting the report by the deadline (see the course calendar)?