CE 385 D

Semester Project

During the semester each student will work on a project dealing with water resources planning and management. These projects will deal with some aspect of a real, complex water resources planning and analysis issue of current interest to the world, nation, or State of Texas. Students must work in teams. The projects typically are interdisciplinary and consider such aspects of water resources planning and management as: engineering, law; economics; hydrology, climatology, hydrogeology; environmental health; computer modeling; population growth; land use planning; regional development; or politics. Each group, or individual, will make an oral presentation of their results to the class and publish a final report on the World Wide Web.

The purposes of the term project are:

To enable you to explore in-depth an aspect of the subject of water resources planning and management..
To provide experience in the formulation, execution and presentation of an engineering investigation in the area of water resources planning and management.
To produce a report in html on the world wide web that will be informative to you and to your classmates.

The steps in carrying out the project are:

Students and the instructor will develop areas of interest for projects. Areas of interest are drawn from the various areas of water resources planning and management.
Students will sign up for an area of interest from the list provided by the instructor.
From the expressed interests of the students, the instructor will prepare lists of team members for the various topical areas.
Teams will then select a specific project topic in their area and prepare a proposal to be submitted electronically by the date specified in the Course Assignment Web Page.
Teams will present their project to the class during one of the final class days of the semester and submit a written report in electronic form to the instructor by the last day of class.

Project presentations should be prepared in electronic form for presentation in class:

Title
Team
Introduction and background to the problem
Methods used to solve the problem including mathematical statement of important equations.
Results including a physically reasonable example with interpretation of results,
Conclusions,

Please refer to the Student Performance Standards for information on expectations for project presentations.

Project reports should be written as a technical report including:

Title
Team
Abstract
Introduction and background to the problem
Methods used to solve the problem including mathematical statement of important equations and description of all parameters, coefficients and necessary data. Data sources should be well documented and referenced.
Results including a physically reasonable example with interpretation of results,
Conclusions,
References, and
Appendices (as appropriate).

The report (in word processor format) should be sent in electronic form to the instructor.

Reports should follow ASCE Journal requirements (http://www.pubs.asce.org/authors/index.html#manreq). In summary:
Double spaced, 1 in. margins, 12 point font, no more than 10,000 words.