Information Organisation

Course manual 2024/2025

Course content

The goal of this course is to introduce students to the theory, principles and practices of information organization including approaches for representation, description, classification and cataloging. Topics covered include the history of information organization, classification schemes, information architecture, encoding standards, metadata schemas, ontologies, knowledge graphs as well as the social and design approaches to information organization systems. 

Study materials

Literature

• 'The Discipline of Organizing', 4th Edition by Robert Glushko

• Scientific papers specified in the course outline

Objectives

• Explain key principles and practices of information organization
• Apply information organization theory and principles and practice to different contexts
• Demonstrate the ability to develop information organization systems
• Critically analyze existing information organization systems
• Understand the social and institutional embedding of organization systems
• Awareness of key standards and tools for information organization

Teaching methods

• Lecture
• Self-study
• Working independently on e.g. a project or thesis
• Computer lab session/practical training

The goal is to understand key concepts in organization of digital information and then apply them both in individual assignments as well as in a larger project. This is done by engaged reading and discussion

Learning activities

Attendance

In TER part B of this programme no requirements regarding attendance are mentioned.

Additional requirements for this course:

Students are expected to prepare themselves before every lecture, in order to get the most out of the lectures. Therefore, students are expected to do the required reading  prior to each lecture. During the lectures, we can then dig deeper into the topic. Discussions play a critical part of this course. Students are expected to actively progress working on their individual and group assignments during the practical sessions.

Assessment

• Full grading scheme
  • The students can earn up to 100 points during the course:
    • 30 points for the individual assignments
    • 30 points for the group assignment
    • 40 points for the exam
  • You must receive at least 21 points on the exam. 
  • The final mark for the course is the sum of earned points across the items, divided by 10 and rounded to the nearest half-mark. 
    • Exception: No 5.5 mark is awarded! 55 points is 6.0 (pass), while 54 points is 5.0 (fail).
• Late policy:
  • You'll be deducted 1 point for every day an assignment is late.
• Retake
  • The retake exam only substitutes for the final exam.

Inspection of assessed work

We will schedule a separate session to go over the assignments and the exam results if requested by a student. 

Assignments

Described in the assignments section of canvas.

Fraud and plagiarism

The 'Regulations governing fraud and plagiarism for UvA students' applies to this course. This will be monitored carefully. Upon suspicion of fraud or plagiarism the Examinations Board of the programme will be informed. For the 'Regulations governing fraud and plagiarism for UvA students' see: www.student.uva.nl

Course structure

Contact information

Coordinator

• Victoria Degeler

Staff

• A.D. Fleck
• E. Karabulut MSc
• M.G. Kebede
• F.E. Yilmaz Polat MSc