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Calhoun Honors Discovery Program Courses

Spring 2025 Courses

CHDP students presenting their project

*Meeting Times: All CHDP courses will be asynchronous. Instructors will provide just-in-time open-to-all, face-to-face instruction based on student needs and requests as they emerge through the online interactions. Times will be adjusted to availability of students for each face to face instruction topic. Digital discussion and interaction forums will also enable peer to peer learning.  Student cohorts will progress through each module together through weekly deadlines that will ensure course completion in 5 weeks and facilitate peer to peer learning.

Calhoun Transdisciplinary Studios

CRNs: 20488, 20489, 20490

Friday 8:00 – 10:50 am, Honors College Studios, Squires 134
3 credits

CRN 20488 – Professor Moyer
CRN 20489 – Professor Ruiz Geli
CRN 20490 – Professor Kretser

This studio course is a practice and prototyping study of transdisciplinary, collaborative design processes to address real-world problems in sociotechnical innovation provided by clients from industry, business, government, and nonprofit organizations. Student teams will be engaged in defining and analyzing real-world problems using Systems thinking and the Collaboration Sociotechnical Innovation Model (CSIM) Four Set framework. Other activities in this class include (but not exclude) the following: Identification and analysis of stakeholders. Skills discovery and transdisciplinary team building. Rapid Prototyping. Collaborative innovation. Evidence-based decision-making. Iterative Design. Troubleshooting.

Having successfully completed this course, students will be able to:

  • Use systems thinking to define & analyze real-world problems in collaborative sociotechnical innovation;
  • Identify stakeholders and analyze their needs in collaborative sociotechnical innovation;
  • Discover their own and their colleagues’ current skills in collaborative sociotechnical innovation;
  • Engage in strategic transdisciplinary team building processes; and
  • Produce rapid prototypes with valid evaluation plans

CRNs: 20499, 20500, 20501

Friday 8:00 – 10:50 am, Honors College Studios, Squires 134
3 credits

CRN 20499 – Professor Ruiz Geli
CRN 20500 – Professor Moyer
CRN 20501 – Professor Kretser

This studio course is an Advanced study of transdisciplinary, collaborative design processes to address real-world problems in sociotechnical innovation provided by clients from industry, business, government, and nonprofit organizations. Student teams will be engaged in developing impactful approaches to address real-world problems using Systems thinking and the Collaboration Sociotechnical Innovation Model (CSIM) Four Set framework. Other activities in this class include (but do not exclude) the following: Systems building; project leadership and management, including resource allocation and scheduling; team management; value propositions; project pitches; and rapid prototyping.

Having successfully completed this course, students will be able to:

  • Use systems thinking & CSIM to develop impactful approaches to address real-world problems in collaborative sociotechnical innovation;
  • Identify stakeholders and analyze their most important requirements in collaborative sociotechnical innovation;
  • Leverage their own and their colleagues’ current skills in collaborative sociotechnical innovation;
  • Engage in strategic transdisciplinary team building processes; and
  • Produce and test rapid prototypes using quantitative and qualitative evaluation methods.

UH 2744: Topics in Computing in Technology Innovation for Societal Impact

*Meeting Times: All CHDP courses will be asynchronous. Instructors will provide just-in-time open-to-all, face-to-face instruction based on student needs and requests as they emerge through the online interactions. Times will be adjusted to availability of students for each face-to-face instruction topic. Digital discussion and interaction forums will also enable peer to peer learning.  Student cohorts will progress through each module together through weekly deadlines that will ensure course completion in 5 weeks and facilitate peer to peer learning.


CRN 20479
Prescriptive & Predictive Analytics (Asynchronous)
1 Credit
Professor Kretser

Programming in Python:

  • Population growth and decay using a simple Leslie model
  • Infectious disease transmission through Monte Carlo simulation
  • Word prediction through Markov Chain modeling
  • Model fitting with Simple Linear Regression
  • Clustering and Unsupervised Learning through k-means and hierarchical clustering


CRN 20478
Estimation, Expectation, Descriptive Analytics
1 Credit
Professor Kretser

  • Types of data/Exploring data/Exploring assumptions
  • Probability, randomness, uncertainty
  • Discrete probability distributions: Bayes Theorem
  • Continuous probability distributions, Sampling
  • Hypothesis testing


CRN 20477
Acquiring and Analyzing Data
1 Credit
Professor Kretser

Programming in Python:

  • What is/are Data? Numbers as Data
  • Images as Data
  • Words as Data
  • The Data Pipeline
  • Data/Big Data Ethics