Project

Project Pitch (5%)

Each student will pitch an idea for an NLP project to the class via a 5-minute presentation. This is aimed to assist in the team formation process. The pitch should address 1) what the problem is that will be solved, 2) why the problem matters, and 3) a preliminary idea about why this project is feasible.

Project Team Formation

After project pitches, students will be expected to form teams of 2-3 to work on an agreed upon project idea.

Project Proposal (10%)

Teams will submit a 1-2 page project proposal (note: references do not count towards limit). The proposal is expected to demonstrate that the teams have thought about their problem, understand how it fits within the related literature, and have a clear and feasible plan to move forward (e.g. considered data and compute resources).

Proposal Requirements:

  • Task Definition: Define the problem and problem motivation. Where relevant, include example inputs and expected outputs.
  • Related Work: Outline the connections between the proposed problem and the related literature.
    • Sources to Look for Related Literature: ACL Anthology, OpenReview (NeurIPS, ICLR, etc.)
  • Hypothesis: Statement of your hypothesis and what criteria you will use to evaluate its validity.
  • Preliminary Plan: A brief description of your preliminary ideas for your approach to test your hypothesis. This may include potential models and baselines, datasets, evaluation strategies, etc.

Project Progress Report (10%)

Teams will submit a ~3 page progress report. This will outline any changes that were made in response to proposal feedback and should demonstrate that non-trivial progress has been made.

Progress Report Requirements:

  • Task Definition: Define the problem and problem motivation. Where relevant, include example inputs and expected outputs.
  • Dataset Details: At this point, the dataset should be finalized.
  • Initial Results: This should be considered a proof of concept (i.e. a motivating result or analysis).
  • Finalized Plan: A concrete plan of what will be accomplished (and how) for the final report.

Project Final Presentation (10%)

Each team will give a 15-20 minute presentation, with 5-10 minutes for QA.

Project Final Report (15%)

Teams will submit an 8 page (excluding references and appendix) final report.

Final Report Requirements:

  • Abstract: What the problem is, why it matters, what the approach is, and main takeaways from the results.
  • Introduction: Introduce and motivate the problem. Brief description of what is accomplished in your project.
  • Related Work: A brief description of the related work, outlining the connections and differences between your work and existing works.
  • Method: A detailed description of your method.
  • Experiment Setup: A description of what models, hyperparameters, baselines, tools, datasets, etc. were used.
  • Results: Quantitative results with descriptive analysis. Results should include tables or figures, which are referenced in the text.
  • Discussion: Additional discussion of how your results relate to your initial hypothesis, a discussion of future work, and a brief discussion of limitations.
  • References: Following ACL formatting.
  • Appendix: If needed for additional details or results.
  • Other Requirements: The report should follow the structure of a *ACL publication. It should include a link to a Github repo with your code and data.