There will be 3, 2-hour exams totally (currently planned for mid Sept, mid Oct, mid Nov).
In addition, there will be a final term paper.
The exams are two-hour, in-class exams (roughly once a month) and the term paper will be due during finals week. All tests will be closed book, by default, and comprehensive of material covered until that point in that course.
The term paper will be on a topic of your choice, but the topics will have to be discussed with me, by providing me with a list of literature you are going to use in your investigation and the specific open problem you will grapple with (the literature list can be empty if you wish, but you have to convince me that the problem is open). The term paper will be graded on these qualities: (a) depth of understanding of the material (includes difficulty of the material) (b) clarity of thought and organization (c) originality and new ideas and results if any (d) exposition and presentation. You can think of it as a mini masters thesis. I would strongly recommend you use LaTeX.
Each test and term paper contributes to 25% of your final grade.
Sample test questions and their solutions may be (if time permits) gone over in class during the exam review sessions, if any.