Instructor |
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General course information: objectives, prerequisites, text, policies, etc.
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Lectures and assignment due dates (subject to revision as the semester proceeds).
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Lecture notes in PDF format.
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HW assignments (will be updated as the semester proceeds).
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Details on your term project, which includes a proposal, in-class presentation,
and final paper.
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Sample datasets from the textbook, also used in lecture. These are copyrighted.
Also see
the textbook's companion website, including Excel 2007 tutorials, self-study quizzes, and
the PHStat2 software.
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Tips and tricks for using Excel, will be updated as the semester progresses.
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Practise questions for the midterm exam on Tue 21 Feb.
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Resources |
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You may find the material from the following courses helpful.
I taught 275 last semester, and
also similar courses
MATH108 (for Nursing) and
MATH102 (for Science).
A link at the bottom takes you even further back.
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We use Excel in class not because it is the most easy-to-use, cheap, or
powerful statistical software (far from it!), but because it is easily
accessible and still widely used in the business world.
- Download the PHStat2 Excel add-on used
by the textbook. Also see
the PHStat homepage.
- For help and tips with Excel,
Bill Jelen's "Mr. Excel" site is useful.
- Excel is not the only spreadsheet software out there; you can try
the free office suite LibreOffice,
or even Google Docs
(although their regression tools are pretty limited without using
add-ons).
- The social and health science folks often rely on IBM's
SPSS, however it is not that easy
to use, and is pretty expensive (although TWU has a site-license).
- Stata is cheaper than SPSS and
has a growing following; I've never used it myself.
- SAS is the old, established
industry leader, especially in financial services and business analytics.
But they are (IMHO) way overpriced and a bit slow to embrace change.
(I do hear they're a great company to work for, though!)
- For those not shy of a command-line interface, there is also the very
powerful (and free) R project.
This is what I use personally; it is the de-facto standard amongst
academic statisticians, and as such constantly has the most cutting-edge
techniques added to its enormous ecosystem.
R is not just software; it's a community!
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Datasets |
Some resources to find data for your term project:
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Every class starts with a short devotional from the Bible, to help keep
everything in perspective!
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