Math 243
Probability and Statistics
Fall 2003

Course Home Page

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Course Description

Instructor
Randall Pruim
office: North Hall 284
phone: (616) 526-7113
E-mail: rpruim@calvin.edu

Time & Location
Section A Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, Friday 9:00-9:50, in North Hall B64

Office Hours
Regular office hours are currently scheduled for
Mondays 11:30-12:20
Tuesdays 2:30-3:20
Thursdays 2:30-3:20
Fridays 11:30-12:20
If these times do not work for you, other times can be arranged by appointment. Alternatively, you can simply stop by my office and see if I am available. (You might like to consult my current schedule before proposing a time.)

Internet Resources

Email
I will maintain an email list of all students registered in this class and will occasionally use it to distribute information and reminders of various things pertaining to this course. If you prefer to read your email from an account other than your calvin student account and do not have it set up to forward automatically, send me email with the email address you prefer. You can also send email to the class list or particular students in the class via KnightVision.

Please check your email daily. You are responsible for any information communicated via email.

Web Pages
In addition to this home page, I will also maintain a list of web resources pertaining to this course. You are responsible for any information appearing on the course web pages. Items I have prepared and maintain online include

For quick access to these and other resources, see the navigation bar at the top of this page.

Other Important Information

See me
If you are having difficulty with any portion of the course, do not hesitate to see me. Do this as soon as possible, certainly well in advance of any deadlines (like tests) so that we can work to fix the problem.

Textbook
The required text for this course is
Applied Statistics for Engineers and Scientists (5th edition) by Jay Devore and Nicholas Farnum

Grading
Grading will be based on the following approximate weighting:
15% Homework, etc.
60% Tests (see calendar for tentative dates)
25% Final Exam (12/15)

Tests should be taken when they are scheduled. I do not generally offer make-up, alternate or late tests. Instead, if you miss one test (for any reason) or if your final exam score is better than your worst test, then your final exam score will be substituted for that test.

Technology
Many of the computations involved in statistics can be automated using a computer or hand-held calculator. The text book comes with a CD that contains many of the data sets from examples and problems of the book. Generally, you should feel free to make use of any calculator or statistical software when doing your homework (there will be a few exceptions where I want you to do things more or less "by hand" using only non-statistical funtions of your calculators).

In class I plan to use a statistical package called R. R is free and available for Mac, PC, or Linux. It has also been installed on the computers in the Mathematics and Statistics Computer Lab (basement of North Hall). We also have a software package called Stata installed on the computers in the Mathematics and Statistics Computer Lab. Stata has a more well-developed user interface, but is less powerful and less flexible than R.

Special Circumstances
Occasionally there are special circumstances that require that the rules and guidelines above be adjusted for a particular student. In such cases, it is the responsibility of the student to inform me of the situation as soon as possible, so that the appropriate arrangements can be made. This includes, but is not limited to, students with documented disabilities.

This page maintained by:
Randall Pruim
Department of Mathematics and Statistics
Calvin College
rpruim@calvin.edu

Last Modified: Monday, 08-Sep-2003 08:40:03 EDT