University College Dublin

Students are introduced to the political, social, and economic history of ancient Greece during the the "Classical" period, c. 480-323 BC. This era spans from the Greco-Persian Wars to the death of Alexander the Great. This course explores sources and methods that modern historians use to study ancient Greek culture, including literary texts that are read in translation and artefacts from the ancient world.

This course builds on the formal analysis skills introduced in FS10010 Introduction to Film and Media. Students are introduced to key theoretical ideas about film and media and a variety of approaches to interpreting and understanding film, television, and digital media in context. Topics may include gender, race, sexuality, industry, and audiences, among others. The course includes case studies in film, television, and other media forms.

This course enables students to explore various aspects of Irish culture and identity in an interdisciplinary and interactive manner, focusing specifically on society, literature and language. Students are introduced to key themes, debates, texts, influences and events that help to provide a greater understanding of how Ireland evolved into the country it is today. The course examines how the language of place and space relates to society; Ireland's Celtic influences; the evolution from manuscript to print culture; the tradition of oral narrative; and literary representations of Ireland in both the English and Irish languages, from early modern sources through to twentieth and twenty-first century texts.

The course provides an introduction to the essentials of computer game development. The process of development by small independents, even single individuals, shares important features with development by large companies: innovation, creativity, storyboarding, software development, testing, deployment, and (sometimes) marketing. Topics include the economic importance of the computer game industry; common genres of games; the development of game software using specialized tools which promote rapid development through their integration of numerous prepackaged components; techniques for representing objects in 2-dimensional and 3-dimensional space, and determining whether they collide; techniques for equipping non-player characters with AI; techniques for producing special effects; gamification, that is, the provision of enjoyably game-like experience to promote education or customer loyalty or other purposes. 

Topics covered in this course include HTML syntax, composition, and validation; cascading style sheets (CSS); basic dynamic scripting examples; site planning, visual information management, and responsive design; digital image formats; and Search Engine Optimization (SEO). Students provide markup for various HTML elements, attributes, and values associated with the representation of web page content. They use CSS to effectively control the presentation of websites and understand the usefulness of incorporating dynamic scripting into web sites. This course teaches students how to differentiate between alternate image formats that are appropriate for web use, make responsive design layouts using CSS Grid and Flexbox, and understand the importance of consistency, structure, and aesthetics of design and how to achieve these. Students learn current W3C standards and recommendations when planning, designing, and publishing a website.

This course provides students with a foundation in geographical data, mapping, spatial analysis, and writing skills. It explores the organization and manipulation of geospatial data, cognitive mapping, and basic statistics, and addresses locational considerations (e.g. coordinates and space), map projections, and map design. It also introduces technological tools and methods available to map, analyze and disseminate geographical information. The course is mainly tutorial-based but includes lectures and local fieldwork, providing an interactive and applied learning environment to explore technical and technological geospatial methods and approaches. In doing so, it enhances students’ geospatial awareness and provide them with skills to examine relationships, interactions, and interdependencies between human and physical components of the environment. 

This course is for students who have no previous knowledge of Irish Sign Language (ISL). Students develop a basic knowledge of signs so that they are able to participate in simple everyday communicative situations. ISL may be of particular value to students seeking a career in health or education or for those who have contact with deaf people through work, friends, or family. It may also be of intrinsic interest to linguists. 

Students are introduced to the expanding field of professionals leading urban climate adaptation and mitigation efforts. With a significant portion of the world's population living in urban areas and accounting for approximately 75% of greenhouse gas emissions, urban residents are highly vulnerable to climate change but also offer important solutions for a more equitable carbon transition. In this course, students explore how cities are addressing this critical challenge. Students engage with professionals working on climate adaptation and mitigation strategies in cities across multiple continents and learn about the primary thematic areas where cities focus their efforts.

This course examines a number of questions regarding education and schooling from a normative perspective. It considers the relevant criteria for evaluating the moral rights and duties of children, parents, and states with regard to education. Students explore some of the most important concepts in political theory such as justice, equality, liberty, autonomy, and community. They also discuss the different aims of education as well as which agents have which responsibilities with regard to enabling children to acquire the capacities for full membership in society. In addition, the course considers which understandings of freedom and equality should inform our thinking about multicultural education and/or demands for equal opportunities for the socially disadvantaged and discuss whether and in how far state schools ought to be neutral with regard to religious and/or cultural norms relating to conceptions of the good life.

This course provides perspective about how a number of both common and rare diseases arise, and explores the associated changes that are seen at the cellular and tissue level. The course uses a number of specific examples of diseases that arise from single point mutations (for example skeletal deformities such as Smith-McCort dysplasia), as well as complex disease that arise from wider sets of gene alterations (for example various cancer types). Lectures are complemented by a series of laboratory classes that expose students to key aspects of how molecular cell biology approaches are used to understand and combat various diseases. Students gain experience with advanced disease models, three-dimensional spheroids, and their characterization by microscopy, as well as how they can be used to assess the efficacy of bioactive compounds. In addition, the laboratory classes teach students how molecular biology methods can be used to diagnose a disease and guide treatment.