Overview
For the last assignment in this course, you are given a topic that requires you to design an experiment capable of answering some question or solving some problem. You will then orally present your experimental design to the class.

Please treat this presentation as a proposal in which you are bidding for a job for your group/company, or as a presentation to your management. Remember that the customer or your management is usually interested in quality results produced with a limited budget.

Reports will be presented during your normal lab period at the end of the semester. You will be expected to be present for the entire session on the day on which you are presenting. You may be present at a session on any day after, but not before, you are scheduled to speak.

Grading
The oral report is a significant part of your total grade.

Part of your grade for the oral report will be based on the content. Prepare your ideas and facts carefully and work them into a clear and interesting story. This is not supposed to be a literature review. You will primarily be judged on the originality of your experimental design, and the degree to which you have considered the implications of your experimental decisions on the usefulness, reliability and accuracy of the data that you hope to obtain, i.e., will the results of your planned experiment answer the question originally posed.

Credit will also be given for a well organized and professionally delivered presentation.

Presentation Format and Length
A typical presentation will have the following information (you do not have follow the exact order listed):

• a title for your presentation, your name, possibly contact information, and other things you would want to have on a title slide;
• a brief introductory section, explaining the problem and your objective(s);
• an explanation of your approach (perhaps in comparison to other choices you considered), including descriptions of: i) the measurement techniques to be employed, and ii) the instrumentation and facility to be used;
• the procedures you would follow, for example what parameters you would vary;
• descriptions of the kind of information and methods of data reduction/analysis you would employ to answer the problem posed; and
• a set of conclusions that "sums up" your findings or recommendations for the audience - these are things that you want your audience to "walk away with" that will convince them that your experiment is the "right" one.

Prepare a few carefully thought out view graphs. To prevent going to fast through each slide or running over the time limit, you should make sure not to average much more than one slide per minute (not including your title slide). The lettering on the view graphs should be large enough for people in the back of the room to read. This means that there is a limit on the amount of information you can put on one view graph. Complete sentences are not required, and in general are nor desirable. Key words and phrases, usually in the form of bullets, are more effective.

Presentations should be at least 5 minutes long, but are not to exceed 8 minutes (your presentation will end at this time, one way or another). This will definitely require you to practice your talk. Your fellow students are encouraged to ask questions; roughly 5 additional minutes following each talk will be allotted for questions. A response to a question posed by a student can only improve the speaker's grade. Answer all questions clearly and say so if you do not know the answer. Trying to "snow" the audience generally results in a complete loss of credibility.

Audio-Visual Equipment
All presentations will be made using a computer projection system provided. Your slide presentation should be prepared using Powerpoint.^TM You will be asked to provide your presentations IN ADVANCE, for example by email to the instructor, BY NOON of the day before your presentation.

Topics
In the last half of the semester, topics will be posted and assigned. When the same topic is assigned to more than one student, it does not mean that this is to be a team effort. Each student must prepare the material independently; you may not discuss or share information with other students in the class. You may, however, use faculty and students outside this class as external experts to help you understand the problem you are being asked to investigate.