Registration: Computer Science Stream
ESP students register in courses differently than other Carleton students, review this page to complete your course selection.
Registration 2026-2027
How do I register for my courses?
ESP students will take three courses per term: one First Year Seminar (FYSM) and two elective courses. With each of your Elective Courses, you will also attend a weekly ESP Workshop. See the Student Guide for information about Workshops.
Follow the steps below or watch our Registration Walkthrough video for detailed instructions on how to complete your ESP course selection.
Registration Steps: Computer Science Stream
1. Familiarize yourself with our course offerings
- Students in the Computer Science stream have set electives but can choose a First Year Seminar.
- Use the dropdown menus below to read about which First-Year Seminars and Elective courses we will be offering this year.
- For each course you’ll find a course description, instructor name, course time, workshop time and tutorial time (if applicable).
- You will take 2 electives courses in the fall and 2 elective courses in the winter.
- First-Year Seminars (FYSM) run in both the fall and winter semester, so you’ll be registered in one FYSM from September to April.
2. Plan your schedule
- Using the First-Year Seminar Course Offerings, rank your top choices from 1 to 4, where 1 is the course you are most interested in taking.
- Use the course descriptions and times to make your selections. You can also use a Blank Timetable to help you understand how your elective courses will fit with your FYSM rankings.
- We will try our best to give you your #1 choice of FYSM but this is dependent on course availability.
3. Submit the online course selection form
Once you’ve reviewed the course offerings below and are ready to choose your courses, please fill out the course selection form below.
First-Year Seminar (FYSM) Course Offerings
You’ll rank these First-Year Seminars and we will place you into one of your top choices.
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- Instructor: Rosie Kerr
- Course Day and Time: Monday 2:35pm-5:25pm
Course description: Ever wonder about the state of the world? If you are interested in international issues this seminar is for you! We will explore global issues affecting all of our lives and dig into the history that led to where we are today. The course will cover: colonization, slavery, industrialization, agriculture modernization, structural adjustment, free trade and globalization. We will explore current issues affected by this history through the lens of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (UN SDGs). This approach will allow us to look at aspirational collective goals and tackle aspects of issues such as inequality, power, knowledge, food, water, climate change and biodiversity. In class, we will engage in many activities and discussions together where students will be invited to ask questions, share perspectives with each other, consider multiple perspectives on an issue and reflect on their learnings. There will be several short writing assignments, a presentation about an issue you are passionate about and a literature review to dig deeper into multiple perspectives on an issue of your choice. This course will develop your writing skills, critical thinking and systems thinking to prepare for any course you will take in your university career.
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- Instructor: Beth Hughes
- Course Day and Time: Tuesday and Thursday 10:05am-11:25am
Course description: This course will develop your understanding of Canada as a society by examining the connections between privilege, power and difference. What are the key social problems? What is social injustice? What groups benefit and what groups are oppressed by social injustice? What structures perpetuate social injustice? How can we become more informed and challenge ideas? Most importantly, how can we create social change?
The goal of this course will be to provide you with the skills and tools necessary to critically analyze oppressive social structures that reinforce harmful narratives and assumptions. Our first class will be truly “lit and fire,” because it examines how slang and language change with new social ideas. Other topics covered include identity, racism, consent, crime, addiction, poverty, racialization, health, addictions, education, the environment, globalization and others that interest you. Lastly, you get to choose a social issue of your choice, and you will analyze the power of individual action and social movements to communicate and create meaningful change.
Our class will go step-by-step, taking a thoughtful and planned approach to how all these ideas fit together. There will be fun and joy in expressing your ideas along the way. These engaging ideas will provide you with many opportunities to understand and develop strong academic skills that will serve you well at university and in future employment:
• reading, writing, revising,
• critical thinking and how to position an argument,
• researching and reading,
• time management, including procrastination,
• early career exploration, and so much more.The following quotation will guide our work together this year. “Canada is a great country, one of the hopes of the world. We can be a better one–a country of greater equality, justice, and opportunity. We can build a prosperous economy and a society that shares its benefits more fairly” (Jack Layton, 2011).
Welcome to Carleton university and ESP!
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- Instructor: Susan Burhoe
- Course Day and Time: Wednesday 11:35am-2:25pm
Course description: Popular culture is everywhere – from the shows we binge, the games we play, and the music we love – to the ads, memes, and celebrity gossip that flood our feeds. But what does it all mean? In this course, we’ll explore how 20th- and 21st-century popular culture both reflects and shapes how we see the world, ourselves and others. From Hollywood fantasies to video game panics, pop culture is more than entertainment; it’s a powerful lens through which we understand society.
You’ll be introduced to key concepts in cultural theory and learn how to “read” cultural “texts” like music videos, ads, memes, TV shows, and brand names. We’ll examine themes of identity, power, and resistance through the lenses of race, gender, class, sexuality, and dis/ability. Why are we so fascinated by celebrities? How does advertising shape our sense of self? What does the response to The Last of Us II tell us about cultural anxieties?
We’ll also dig into broader debates about representation. Who gets seen and heard in popular culture—and who doesn’t? Whose stories dominate, and whose are left out? Expect lively discussions, engaging media clips (from TV and film to internet culture), and collaborative activities. Assignments include short reflections, an exam, and a project where you’ll analyze a pop culture topic of your choice in an essay, video, or podcast. Along the way, you’ll also build key academic skills to support your success in university.
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- Instructor: Kory Smith
- Course Day and Time: Wednesday 6:05pm-8:55pm
Course description: In Canada, almost half of adults will experience a serious legal issue over the course of a three-year period. Yet, many of these individuals lack meaningful access to legal justice. Barriers related to financial cost, time, complexity, lack of information, and availability of legal services result in legal problems going unaddressed. Vulnerable and marginalized populations experience further barriers to accessing legal justice. Timely access to legal justice will help support the well-being of individuals and communities.
This interdisciplinary first-year seminar will provide you with theoretical and methodological tools to help you understand and respond to access to legal justice issues. You will explore questions from legal, sociological, historical, philosophical, and political perspectives. Questions that will be addressed include: What is justice? What is legal justice? What is access to legal justice? What are the causes and consequences of unmet legal needs? What are the experiences of justice system participants? What is the relationship between access to legal justice and inequality and oppression? What are some potential solutions to access to legal justice problems?
This course is designed to be as experiential as possible. Methods of instruction include interactive lecturing, class discussion, student presentations, field trips, and guest speakers. Assignments and in-class activities will be used to help you develop the following academic skills: studying, research, writing, and oral communication. Your grade in the course will be based on several different types of evaluation: attendance and participation, weekly journal entries, an essay proposal and annotated bibliography, an essay, and a presentation and presentation reflection.
Computer Science Stream Elective Course Offerings
All students in the Computer Science Stream will take the elective courses listed below along with the associated tutorials and workshops.
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You’ll take: Computer Science (COMP) in the Fall AND Computer Science in the Winter
FALL: COMP 1005 B: Introduction to Computer Science I
Course description: Introduction to computer science and programming. Topics include: algorithm design; control structures; variables and types; linear collections; functions; debugging and testing. Special attention is given to procedural programming in a modern language, computational thinking skills, and problem decomposition.
- Instructor: Robert Collier
- Course Day and Time: Tuesday and Thursday 11:35am-12:55pm
- Tutorial Day and Time:
- ESP Workshop Day and Time: TBD
- Workshop Facilitator Name: TBD
WINTER: COMP 1006 C: Introduction to Computer Science II
Course description: A second course in programming emphasizing problem solving and computational thinking in an object-oriented language. Topics include abstraction, mutable data structures, methods, inheritance, polymorphism, recursion, program efficiency, testing and debugging.
- Instructor: Ava McKenney
- Course Day and Time: Monday and Wednesday 10:05am-11:25am
- Tutorial Day and Time: Thursday 6:05pm-7:25pm OR Thursday 7:35pm-8:55pm
- ESP Workshop Day and Time: TBD
- Workshop Facilitator Name: TBD
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You’ll take: Mathematics (MATH) in the Fall AND Mathematics in the Winter
FALL: MATH 1007 B: Elementary Calculus l
Course description: Limits. Differentiation of the elementary functions, including trigonometric functions. Rules of differentiation. Applications of differentiation: max-min problems, curve sketching, approximations. Introduction to integration: definite and indefinite integrals, areas under curves, fundamental theorem of calculus.
- Instructor: Brandon Fodden
- Course Day and Time: Tuesday and Thursday 1:05pm-2:25pm
- Tutorial Day and Time: Thursday 4:35pm-5:25pm
- ESP Workshop Day and Time: TBD
- Workshop Facilitator Name: TBD
WINTER: MATH 1104 I: Linear Algebra for Engineering or Science
Course description: Systems of linear equations. Matrix algebra. Determinants. Invertible matrix theorem. Cramer’s rule. Vector space R^n; subspaces, bases. Eigenvalues, diagonalization. Linear transformations, kernel, range. Complex numbers (including De Moivre’s theorem). Inner product spaces and orthogonality. Applications.
- Instructor: Inna Bumagin
- Course Day and Time: Tuesday and Thursday 2:35pm-3:55pm
- Tutorial Day and Time: Tuesday 7:05pm-7:55pm
- ESP Workshop Day and Time: TBD
- Workshop Facilitator Name: TBD