Quarter: Spring 2026 | Instructor: Jamie Morgenstern
HW0 due: Wednesday, April 8, 2026 at 11:59pm UPDATED: Thursday, April 9, 2026 at 6:25pm (just before class). HW0 PDF | Code (hw0-A.zip) | Image File | hw0.tex | macro.tex
HW1 due: Friday, April 24, 2026 at 11:59pm. HW1 PDF | Code (hw1-A.zip) | hw1.tex
Homeworks must be done individually: each student must hand in their own answers, and each student must write their own code in the programming part of the assignment. It is acceptable for students to collaborate in figuring out answers and helping each other solve the problems.
List all collaborators and external resources: list every person with whom you discussed any problem in any depth, and every reference (outside of our course slides, lectures, and textbook) that you used. This is not a license to get around turning in your own work, but is in your best interest to avoid us suspecting cheating. Collaborating with others and not acknowledging it is considered plagiarism.
You can discuss and work out a solution with your listed collaborators, but do not take notes, photos, or other artifacts of your collaboration. Erase the board you were working on, and once you're alone, write up your answers yourself. If you ever find yourself copying notes (e.g., from a whiteboard) or pasting code, you have crossed the line. Highly similar phrases, equations, or code excerpts shared between homeworks will leave us with a high degree of suspicion that the Collaboration Policy was not followed. We use automated tools to check for such similarities across submissions.
Appropriate use of AI tools (e.g., ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude, Github CoPilot, Cursor, or any other LLM-based tech): AI tools can serve as valuable resources for personalized tutoring, which can facilitate your learning of course material. You are strongly encouraged to use it to clarify any questions you may have or to learn about related concepts discussed in class. It is also very helpful for unfamiliar syntax--how do I swap two dimensions of this PyTorch tensor? However, we define AI tools as collaborators, and therefore your AI usage must respect our Collaboration Policy. You can use AI tools to help work through problems, but you may not ask it to do the problem for you. You can ask how to accomplish some coding operation (e.g., syntax) but you cannot ask it to implement an algorithm and copy and paste the solution. You must write up your answers yourself, having closed the AI tool and without consulting the AI responses. Emphasizing the guidance of above: when you are writing up your homework, you may not use notes, screenshots, code, or other artifacts from your AI interaction. If you ever find yourself copy/pasting anything from anywhere into your homework, you have violated the Collaboration Policy.
You are required to document your use of AI tools on the homeworks. If you use AI tools to guide you when completing a homework problem, you must document all prompts and AI responses, and you must include this documentation in your submission PDF. You must also include the following attestation: "I did not use notes, screenshots, code, or other artifacts from this AI interaction when writing up my solutions."
Appropriate use of AI coding assistants (e.g., Github CoPilot, Cursor, etc): These tools can automatically write code based on comments and even predict what should be written next. We strongly recommend you do not use AI coding assistants for your homework. It would be very difficult to use these tools in a manner that adheres to our Collaboration Policy. You should gain experience using these tools effectively, but that should be done outside of this course. You're taking this course so you can learn the material and become a proficient and independent thinker. To get there, you need to go through the effort of deriving and implementing algorithms on your own, even if you later use libraries or tools to make coding easier. In this exciting new era of powerful AI tools, a huge part of becoming a productive and hirable ML practitioner requires an understanding of ML fundamentals and practice (including theory and coding) so that you can effectively collaborate with AI agents, verify their results, and guide them when they (frequently!) produce unintended output. You need to be able to correct their mistakes, and that requires establishing independent expertise.
Zero-tolerance policy: By turning in the first assignment, you acknowledge that you have read and understood the Collaboration Policy. Any questions about the policy should be raised at least 24 hours before the assignment is due. There are no warnings or second chances. If we suspect you have violated the Collaboration Policy, we will report it to the College of Engineering who will complete an investigation.
