6.856J/18.416J Randomized Algorithms (Spring 2021)

Lecture:	2:30-4 Monday, Wednesday, Friday (Online Lectures)
Units:	5-0-7
Instructor:	David Karger	karger@mit.edu
TAs:	Thiago Bergamaschi	thiagob@mit.edu
Office Hours:	TBD

Course Announcements

NB Discussion System

Course Information

If you are thinking about taking this course, you might want to see what past students have said about previous times I taught Randomized Algorithms, in 2013, 2005, or 2002.

Problem Sets

Submission

• We will use gradescope to electronically collect and grade homeworks.
• You will receive a registration link from gradescope to create an account.
• Once you have an account you can simply use the link next to the problem set to submit your solution.
• Make sure to use a seperate page for each (sub-)problem.
• Gradescope lets you associate each subproblem with the corresponding pages on your solution. Make sure not to skip this step. Your problem set will not be graded otherwise, and you will lose the corresponding points!
• After your submission has been graded, you can submit a regrade request directly in gradescope.

Due Date and Late Submission

• Problem sets are due Wednesdays at the beginning of class (2.30pm).
• Each student has a total budget of 15 "slack" points to accommodate his/her late problem submissions. Each problem that is submitted late but in before Friday class will consume one slack point (and incur no grade penalty). If that problem is submitted in before Monday class, it will consume two slack points (and, again, incur no grade penalty). No late problem will be considered if submitted after the Monday class begins. (So, for example, if there is a problem set with a total of five problems on it, submitting three of these problems on time, one of them before Friday class, and one of them before Monday class will consume three slack points in total.)
• Late submission can directly be submitted to gradescope as well.
• In order for the late submission to be graded students are additionally required to fill out the late submission form. The link to the form can be found next to the problem set.

Policy

• Collaboration is strongly encouraged except where explicitly forbidden. However, each person must independently write up his/her own solution, and you must list all collaborators for each problem on your problem set. Collaboration groups should be small (3 or 4 students) to ensure that everyone is actively engaged with the problems.
• You may not seek out answers from other sources without prior permission. In particular, you may not use bibles or posted solutions to problems from previous years.

Peer Grading

• Each student is required to grade (at least but hopefully) one problem in the semester.
• We will have a TA-supervised grading session each week. This session is used to make sure that the graders fully understand the solution, while they can grade the problems at home after this session.
• Please use the link next to the problem set, to sign up as grader for the corresponding problem set.
• Note that no late submissions are allowed if you sign up as peer-grader.

Lectures

• The lecture schedule is tentative and will be updated throughout the semester to reflect the material covered in each lecture.
• The notes are my own lecture notes; they will not serve to teach the material but should serve as a record of what was covered in each lecture.
• Note that all course notes can be found in nb, where you can read and annotate them with questions.
• Lecture recordings can be found here.