Final Reflection

Length: approx. 1,250–1,750 words (approx. 5–7 double-spaced pages), excluding references. This is a suggestion to give you an idea of what meeting all rubric requirements would “look” like.

First draft is due Dec 2, end of the day

Final draft is due Dec 16, end of the day

You will complete this assignment individually.

Learning Objectives

By completing this assignment, you will be able to:

  1. Trace how your thinking about the social, legal, and ethical dimensions of computing has changed (or not) over the semester, using your own writing as evidence.
  2. Explain what caused those changes, connecting specific discussions, readings, and assignments to shifts in your perspective.
  3. Revisit your positionality and your ethics framework, identifying what still holds, what you would revise, and what you now see that you did not see before.
  4. Articulate a forward-looking professional commitment: how you intend to act as someone who will design, build, deploy, or govern computing systems.
  5. Practice reflective academic writing that is specific, honest, and grounded in evidence.

Overview

In Assignment 0 you described the vantage point from which you see computing. In Assignment 1 you built an ethics framework and used it to analyze a technology. In Assignment 2 you applied course concepts to a concrete case through fiction, interviews, or an audit. All semester you have also been keeping a reflective journal after our discussions.

This final paper asks you to look back at that body of work and then look forward. You are the subject of this paper: what did you think in September, what do you think now, why, and what will you do with it?

You have an unusual amount of evidence to work with. Use it. A strong reflection does not say “this class really opened my eyes.” It says “on September 23 I wrote that regulation mostly slows innovation. After reading about [specific case] and interviewing [person], I now think that claim depends on who bears the cost of the delay, and here is why.”

Change is not required. If your views held steady, that is a legitimate finding, but you need to show that they were tested: what challenged them, and why they survived. You will be graded on the depth and honesty of your reflection, not on how much you changed or on which views you hold.

What to Write About

Your paper should be a cohesive, first-person essay (do not write a list of answers to the prompts). It should address the three parts below, but you decide how much space each one gets and in what order. Use the prompts to generate ideas. You do not need to answer every prompt.

Part 1: Looking back

Reread your positionality statement (Paper 0) and your journal before you write anything.

  • What did you assume about technology at the start of the semester? Which of those assumptions are still yours, and which are not?
  • Is there anything in your positionality statement you would now write differently? Anything you left out that you now think matters? A blind spot you can now name?
  • How has your ethics framework from Paper 1 held up? Did you find yourself using it, adapting it, or abandoning it when we moved to new topics (privacy, algorithmic justice, intellectual property, frontier AI, governance)?

Part 2: What moved you

Identify two or three specific moments that shifted, complicated, or reinforced your thinking. These can be:

  • a class discussion (what was said, and what you wrote in your journal afterward)
  • a reading or current event
  • something that happened while working on a paper: a counterargument you could not easily answer, something your interviewee said, a result from your audit, a scene you struggled to write
  • a disagreement with a classmate (do not identify classmates by name)

For each moment, explain why it had the effect it did. Connecting the moment back to your positionality is often where the most interesting reflection happens: why did this land for you?

Part 3: Looking forward

Most of you will build, deploy, buy, or regulate computing systems. This part asks you to commit to something concrete.

  • Is there something you would refuse to build or refuse to work on? Where exactly is the line, and what would make you reconsider?
  • If you saw a problem with a system at work (bias, privacy violation, unsafe deployment), what would you realistically do? Who would you talk to? What would it cost you, and what might make it hard to act?
  • Who do you think should decide how powerful computing technologies are developed and deployed, and what role do you see for yourself in that process?
  • What questions from this course remain unresolved for you?

Be realistic rather than heroic. “I will never work for a company that collects personal data” is hard to keep and easy to write. A commitment that names a specific situation, acknowledges the pressures (financial, professional, social) that make it difficult, and explains what you would do anyway is far more convincing.

Requirements

  • Length: 1,250–1,750 words, excluding references. This is a suggestion to give you an idea of what meeting all rubric requirements would “look” like.
  • Evidence from your own work: Quote or closely paraphrase at least two journal entries (identify them by date) and your positionality statement. You may also draw on Papers 1 and 2 and the feedback you received on them.
  • Course material: Engage with at least three course readings, discussions, or frameworks by name. At least one should come from the second half of the semester (Week 9 onward).
  • Citations: Cite readings and any outside sources. Use one citation style consistently — APA, Chicago, or ACM are all fine. If you have no preference, use APA. Include a reference list at the end. (You do not need to formally cite your own journal or papers. Identifying them by date or title in the text is enough.)
  • Voice: First person (“I”). This is a personal, reflective essay, but it should still make claims and support them.
  • Specificity: Ground every claim about your own growth in a concrete example. “I learned that algorithms can be biased” is weak. “In my audit I expected the resume screener to treat both names the same, and when it did not, I realized my framework had no way to account for harms the user never sees” is strong.

What This Assignment Is Not

  • It is not a course evaluation. I want to hear about your thinking, not whether you liked the readings. (Course feedback is welcome through the official course evaluations.)
  • It is not a summary of the topics we covered. Assume your reader took the course with you.
  • It is not a performance of transformation. Overclaiming (“this class completely changed how I see everything”) is less convincing than an honest account of what shifted, what did not, and what you are still unsure about.
  • It is not graded on your views. Students with very different conclusions about technology, regulation, and their own careers can all earn full marks.

Grading Rubric

We will be grading your paper on a 20-point scale:

  • Looking back (5 points)
    • accurately represents your starting point, using your positionality statement and journal as evidence
    • identifies what changed, what held, and what became more complicated
    • revisits your positionality and/or framework and names at least one thing you would now revise or one blind spot you now see
  • What moved you (5 points)
    • identifies two or three specific moments, discussions, readings, or experiences
    • explains why each had the effect it did, not only that it did
    • connects these moments to your own positionality
  • Engagement with course material (3 points)
    • engages with at least three course readings, discussions, or frameworks accurately and by name
    • includes at least one from Week 9 onward
    • uses course concepts to explain your thinking rather than name-dropping them
  • Looking forward (5 points)
    • states a concrete professional commitment or line you would not cross
    • acknowledges the realistic pressures and tradeoffs involved
    • addresses who should decide and what your role in that might be
    • names at least one question that remains open for you
  • Writing and mechanics (2 points)
    • clear organization and structure, paper is readable, not convoluted
    • meets length, evidence, and citation requirements
    • proofread

Drafts and Revision

This paper has a first draft (due Dec 2, end of the day) and a final draft (due Dec 16, end of the day). You get about a week of feedback turnaround between them.

The first draft is graded, and it should be a complete attempt with all three parts present. Note that our discussion on Professional Ethics: What Will You Refuse to Build? happens after the first draft is due. Write a real Part 3 for your first draft anyway. You will then have a chance to revisit it after that discussion, and the comparison between your first-draft commitment and your final-draft commitment can itself be good material for reflection. If a section is still rough, mark it with a comment in the doc telling me what you are stuck on.

For the final draft, revise in the same google doc. I want to see what changed.

Recall the course revision policy from the syllabus:

  • Students who earn less than a B on any writing assignment are required to meet with a TA before submitting the final draft of the following assignment.
  • Students who earn a B-, B, or B+ are required to send a rough draft to a TA before submitting the final draft of the following assignment.
  • Students may resubmit major writing assignments with no penalty until the last day of class by meeting with a TA and revising their original submission.

The TAs and the Center for Writing exist for exactly this. Use them.

A Note on Privacy

As with your positionality statement, reflective writing can surface personal material. Share only what you are comfortable sharing. Your paper will be read only by me and course staff and will not be shared with the class. If any part of this assignment feels difficult, come talk to me.

Getting Started

  1. Reread everything first. Read your positionality statement, your full journal, and the feedback on Papers 1 and 2 in one sitting. Take notes on anything that surprises you about your past self.
  2. Make a before/after table. In one column, list three or four things you believed or assumed in September. In the other, write what you think now. The rows where the two columns differ (or where they are the same but for new reasons) are your paper.
  3. Find your moments. For each row that changed, ask: when did that happen? Go find the journal entry, reading, or paper section.
  4. Draft Part 3 honestly. Before writing, imagine a specific job offer or a specific request from a manager that would test your commitment. Write about that situation, not about principles in the abstract.
  5. Revise for specificity. Replace every vague statement about growth with a date, a quote, a reading, or a scene.
  6. Check your citations and your word count, then proofread.

Academic Integrity & Use of AI

This assignment is about your thinking over the semester, so it must be written by you in your own words. Generative AI tools may be used for brainstorming (bring your own ideas into that process) and for proofreading (grammar, clarity of your own prose), but not to generate the substance of your reflection. Do not use an LLM to summarize your journal or your previous papers. Rereading them yourself is a substantial part of the work this assignment is assessing.

An LLM asked to write a reflection on a computing ethics course will produce fluent, generic text about “growth” and “responsibility” that is exactly what this rubric scores as weak. Verify every source you cite by reading it.

If you opt to use an LLM tool, disclose any use in a note at the end of your paper, as described in the syllabus. For example:

“For this assignment, I used [list of AI tools used in assignment] for [specific purpose, e.g., generating an outline, summarizing sources, grammar revision] but not for [list of student contribution, e.g., direct content creation.]”