Welcome to IDS. What Follows Is an Overview of the Class and Some of the Things That You

IDS Syllabus

Welcome to IDS. What follows is an overview of the class and some of the things that you should know and do to excel in the class. Attention to detail and perseverance will virtually guarantee success in this class.

Overview: IDS could be viewed as a pre-stat course as we will cover various topics typically covered in a proper statistics course. Among these are means, standard deviations, basic probability techniques, and the normal distribution. This class differs, however, in a couple of key ways. The first is that unlike a traditional class, we will generate much of our own data. A second fundamental difference is that you will be introduced to a statistical computer program language called R-Studio. There are few typical days in this class. On any given day, you may find yourself in a computer lab, making a presentation, working on a class project, or taking notes.

Materials: All students should have at all times two pencils, a pen, a composition book, and a binder. Rarely, you will need to use your cell phone in class. There is no textbook. While not required, ideally you will figure out a way to acquire a graphing calculator. Students with these calculators will absolutely learn more than those without.

Attendance: Much of what we do in this class involves working with others on time sensitive assignments. It is virtually impossible to make up many of the assignments in this class. Seniors are particularly advised to monitor their own attendance as they often find a range of reasons to legitimately miss class. The most successful students are always in class and on time. Be one of these people.

Grading: Grades will be based on quizzes (mostly surprise), exams, homework, practicums and presentations, your ability to learn R-Studio, and also my perception of you. Do every single assignment to the best of your ability and you will be just fine. Slackers never do well in any of my classes. I may ultimately use a curve for final grades, but I pretty closely follow a standard scale where 90% and above yields an A, 80 to 89% a B, etc. Borderline grades will largely be determined by the aforementioned perception that I have of your performance during the course of the year.

Rules: Just the usual things. No food, drinks, phones, sleeping, profanity, littering, insults, etc.

Bottom Line: We live in a data world. It is therefore essential to learn how to analyze data. It is extremely likely that if you attend college, you will be required at some point to take a statistics course. Many suffer terribly in theses college level courses. This class will go a long way in easing the pain.