13  Final Assignment: Building Your Reproducible Quarto Book

Portfolio Development • Professional Publishing • Becoming an Author

14 Overview

Your final assignment is to transform all of your completed course work into a polished, cohesive Quarto book.

Throughout the semester, every assignment was written in Quarto format for a reason. Now, you will combine them into a single published book.

You will:

  • Convert your assignments into a structured Quarto book project
  • Organize them into chapters
  • Polish formatting and presentation
  • Publish your completed book

This book will serve as a professional portfolio artifact that you can share with:

  • Potential employers
  • Graduate programs
  • Research labs
  • Collaborators
  • Friends and family

By completing this assignment, you are not just submitting coursework —

You are officially becoming an author.

15 Learning Objectives

By completing this project, you will:

  • Organize multiple Quarto documents into a unified book structure
  • Apply consistent formatting and narrative across chapters
  • Improve clarity, presentation, and documentation
  • Practice professional-level data communication
  • Publish a complete analytical portfolio

16 Textbook Connection

This final assignment synthesizes concepts in Reproducible Research Using R.

Students are encouraged to review the chapter before beginning this assignment, as it provides the conceptual foundation and reproducible workflow demonstrated here.

17 Assignment Requirements

17.1 1. Create a Quarto Book Project

You must:

  • Create a Quarto book project (_quarto.yml configured as a book)
  • Organize your assignments as individual chapters
  • Ensure the book renders successfully from start to finish
  • Publish your completed book (via your chosen publishing method)

Your book must render cleanly without errors.

17.2 2. Required Chapters (In This Order)

Your book must include the following chapters, in this exact order:

  1. R Script → R Markdown Report
  2. Homework: Continuing the Law Firm Analysis (Part 2)
  3. Midterm
  4. NBA Analytics – Exploring Team Performance Through Reproducible Analysis
  5. Florida Crime Analytics – Uncovering the Root of Florida’s Crime Surge
  6. Streaming Analytics – Understanding Platform Popularity Across Age Groups
  7. Wage Analytics – Predicting High vs Low Earners Using Logistic Regression
  8. RMarkdown, Shiny, and NYC 311 Data

Each chapter must be its own .qmd file.

17.3 3. Title Page

Your book must include a professional title page containing:

  • A clear, descriptive book title
  • Your full name
  • Course name and semester
  • A short “About This Book” section (2–4 sentences)

This page should feel polished and intentional.

17.4 4. Cover Image

Your book must include a cover image.

Your cover image can be:

  • Something you designed
  • An image related to your analyses
  • A professional photo or graphic
  • A visual that represents your identity as a data analyst

The image must be appropriate and professional.

17.5 5. Chapter Introductions

Each chapter must begin with a short introduction explaining:

  • The purpose of the assignment
  • The skills or methods used
  • Any relevant context for the reader

If the original assignment does not contain a chapter introduction, you must add one.

Think of this as guiding a new reader through your work.

17.6 6. Figure and Table Captions

Every figure, plot, and table must include:

  • A clear, descriptive caption
  • An explanation of what the reader is viewing
  • Why the figure or table matters

Use proper Quarto chunk options (e.g., fig-cap) to ensure captions render correctly.

There should be no unlabeled figures in your book.

17.7 7. Final Reflection Chapter

Your final chapter must be a reflective essay (minimum 400 words) addressing:

  • What you learned this semester
  • What challenged you the most
  • What you are most proud of
  • How your skills and confidence have changed
  • How reproducibility has influenced your thinking

This chapter should be written in thoughtful, professional prose.

18 Book Quality Standards

Your book should:

  • Render cleanly from beginning to end
  • Have consistent formatting across chapters
  • Include clear headings and subheadings
  • Avoid redundant code or messy output
  • Suppress unnecessary warnings/messages
  • Demonstrate attention to detail

This is not a collection of assignments.

It is a cohesive analytical portfolio.

19 Publishing Requirement

You must publish your completed Quarto book.

Your submission must include:

  • A link to your published book
  • Your complete Quarto book project folder

Your published book should be accessible and shareable.

20 Grading (100 Points Total)

  • Structure & Organization (20 pts)
    Proper chapter order, functioning book structure

  • Reproducibility (20 pts)
    Clean rendering, working code, no errors

  • Presentation & Formatting (20 pts)
    Consistent style, captions, polished layout

  • Chapter Introductions (10 pts)
    Clear context provided for each chapter

  • Final Reflection (15 pts)
    Depth, thoughtfulness, clarity

  • Professionalism (15 pts)
    Overall quality, cohesion, publication readiness

21 Reproducibility Practice

Your book must:

  • Render entirely from source files
  • Load all required packages explicitly
  • Avoid hard-coded outputs
  • Avoid manual edits to results
  • Use consistent chunk labeling
  • Be reproducible on another machine

The goal is that anyone could download your project and recreate your entire book.

22 Takeaway

By completing this assignment, you will leave the course with:

  • A complete analytical book
  • A published portfolio artifact
  • Demonstrated mastery of reproducible workflows
  • Authorship credit
  • A powerful representation of your growth

This is the culmination of your semester’s work.

Make it something you are proud to share.