Spring 2027

Human Factors in Information Security

Human Factors in Information Security introduces personal, social, and organizational concepts, skills, and processes for enhancing individual and organizational security and privacy, especially online.

offering recorded3 credits
Recorded instructors · Spring 2027 Dorothea Salo3.7/5

Summary

1 / 6

Past student reviews · Dorothea Salo

The course was video lecture and reading heavy, though students described it as fairly easy overall.

What you’ll be able to do

  • Communicate clearly and effectively to non-expert audiences about security vulnerabilities and security-related incidents.

  • Mitigate common human-centered risks to information security and privacy.

  • Develop awareness of the structure of the information security field, and career opportunities within it.

  • Build strategies and sources for current awareness of security issues.

  • Demonstrate understanding of professional competencies important for management of information organizations.

  • Demonstrate understanding of societal, legal, policy or ethical information issues.

  • Demonstrate understanding of issues surrounding marginalized communities and information.

Source: UW Guide

Grade history

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average GPA
letter grades
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All recorded terms · compare terms & instructors

Prerequisites

Course map

Junior standing

  • Junior standing
LIS 510

This is a best-effort interpretation; check the catalog requirements above.

Prerequisite text tree
  • Junior standing

Professors

Spring 2027
Adjusted rating
RMP difficulty
captured reviews
About this rating

Raw average: 3.82/5 from 11 quality ratings. The adjusted rating blends this with the UW review average (3.66/5), weighted as 20 additional ratings. Smaller samples stay closer to that average. Each captured review is counted once in the prior; this does not correct who chooses to leave a review.

For this course: 3.8/5 raw quality · 2.2/5 difficulty · 5 reviews

RMP profile ↗ · All captured review dates; profile matched by name.

Past student reviews · Dorothea Salo

Dorothea Salo led a welcoming, thought-provoking course with constructive feedback, though one student found her lectures frequently included personal beliefs. The class was described as easy with a heavy focus on video lectures and readings.

Recent recorded grades — Fall 2024: 3.64 GPA, 80.6% A/AB (n=36 letter grades); Spring 2025: 3.73 GPA, 87.3% A/AB (n=142 letter grades); Spring 2026: 3.69 GPA, 86.0% A/AB (n=114 letter grades).

Historical instructors & teaching patterns

DOROTHEA SALO is recorded teaching in Spring 2022, Spring 2023, Fall 2023, Spring 2024, Fall 2024, Spring 2025, Spring 2026. Recorded history may be incomplete and does not establish a future schedule.

Recorded history may be incomplete and does not establish a future schedule.

Calendar & sections

Spring 2027

Schedule loads here as you scroll.

SectionModeEnrolled / capacityWaitlist
LEC 001Online Only0 / 1100

Times are Central. Select a meeting for details; export includes recorded dates for the selected sections. Enrollment reflects scan time.

Meeting source records
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Student experience

the class

Past student reviews · Dorothea Salo

Dorothea Salo taught a welcoming and engaging course with thought-provoking lectures, creating a supportive environment for student success.

Recent recorded grades — Spring 2025: 3.73 GPA, 87.3% A/AB (n=142 letter grades); Fall 2025: 3.46 GPA, 80.4% A/AB (n=51 letter grades); Spring 2026: 3.69 GPA, 86.0% A/AB (n=114 letter grades).

difficulty & workload

Past student reviews · Dorothea Salo

The course was video lecture and reading heavy, though students described it as fairly easy overall.

Past student reviews · Dorothea Salo

While the instructor was passionate, some students felt the homework assignments and readings did not always connect to the main course material.

Topics

  • Personal, social, and organizational information security concepts
  • Enhancing security and privacy, especially online
  • Structure of the information security field and career opportunities
  • Issues surrounding marginalized communities and information

Skills

  • Communicating security vulnerabilities and incidents to non-expert audiences
  • Mitigating human-centered risks to information security and privacy
  • Building strategies for current awareness of security issues

Grades

Latest available · Spring 2026— not enough history to project Spring 2027.

average GPA
A / AB grades
letter grades
Instructor

Grade distribution · % of letter grades

A
AB
B
BC
C
D
F

Grades over time

Through Spring 2026

More grade details Grade mix, volume & source data

Where this course fits relative to

Latest available grades · Spring 2026 · all course levels

GPA

Higher than % of other courses in this group.

Course GPAs · red marks this course’s range

letter grades

More recorded grades than % of other courses in this group.

Typical course in this group: letter grades.

About this comparison

1280 courses over the same term, each with at least 30 recorded letter grades. Cross-listed courses count once. GPA is not a measure of difficulty or teaching quality. The typical course is the median by recorded grade count; tied values are not counted as lower. Grade counts describe course scale, not unique students or typical section size.

Descriptions compare GPA with this group’s average: at least 0.20 higher or lower; otherwise close to average. Section size uses median recorded enrollment: small up to 30, mid-sized 31–99, large 100+. Lectures and discussion/lab sections are described separately.

Sources & history

UW–Madison

Catalog & offerings

Descriptions, prerequisites, and recorded course offerings.

Catalog observation history

Observations at scan time; dates do not imply when a catalog change took effect.

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Selected offering source records
LIS 510 · Spring 2027

Human Factors in Information Security

Recorded 2026-10-29
Raw records 
[
  {
    "run_id": "20261029T213040-0fa85c20",
    "semester": "1274",
    "observed_at": "2026-10-29 21:30:40.248904+00:00",
    "offering_id": "1274:544:025251",
    "course_id": "LIS 510",
    "course_uid": "course_3e202bacc4359a8c0a17dba4",
    "term_id": "1274",
    "source_course_id": "025251",
    "source_subject_id": "544",
    "title": "Human Factors in Information Security",
    "credits_min": 3,
    "credits_max": 3,
    "typically_offered": "Not Applicable"
  }
]
Rate My Professors

Student reviews

Original comments behind the course and instructor summaries.

Read original reviews
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Madgrades

Grade history

Recorded grade distributions by term, section, and instructor.

Explore recorded grades
Dataset & model

Recorded 2026-10-29

View the dataset on Hugging Face
Model outputs & technical records
Qwen/Qwen3.8-27B
LLM outputs across runs
Download part 1
Full model traces

Recorded model configuration, reasoning, and tool conversations.

Download part 1
Model & dataset provenance 
{
  "model": "Qwen/Qwen3.8-27B",
  "model_revision": "1d4bf0f2ff6012fd82039f2fa52739d0dd7c60c0",
  "task_version": "17",
  "output_id": "5afe060ad1c1b993d53ea59b70d085560add3102b265a3b560a2b607cc02d4ef",
  "requirements_status": "valid",
  "dataset_revision": "c9cd06eaa45f9ddf7e69faa38b89ff3d3dd995dd",
  "observed_at": "2026-10-29 21:30:40.248904+00:00"
}