IT 223 Data Analysis

Winter 2006

Instructor

Dr. Craig Miller
Office: 830 CTI Building, 312-362-5085
Email: cmiller@cs.depaul.edu
Office Hours: Announced on Web page

Course Meeting

Monday and Wednesday 3:10 - 4:40
Lewis 1511

Required Text

Introduction to the Practice of Statistics, by D.S. Moore and G.P. McCabe. Any recent edition (i.e. third through the fifth) will work.

Optional Text

Many of the projects will use Excel (and optionally SAS or SPSS). You might want to buy an inexpensive tutorial on Excel (e.g. "Excel 2003 Bible" or "Excel for Dummies") if you are not familiar with Excel. Some class time will be spent covering how to use Excel and SAS.

Overview

This course surveys descriptive statistics, introduces inferential statistics and practices their application through the use of statistical software. While the content of the course has broad application, applications in computing are emphasized.

The use of Excel and SAS will be taught in class. Students may use any statistical analysis tool of their choosing when completing class assignments. Students who plan to take more statistics in this school are encouraged to use SAS for some of the projects.

Goals

A broad understanding of descriptive and inferential statistics is the primary goal of this course. In addition, students are expected to develop and practice the following skills:

Grade Determination

20% (40 points) Eight homework assignments (5 points each)
20% (40 points) Two quizzes (20 points each)
25% (50 points) Midterm Exam
35% (70 points) Final Exam

Students receiving more than 90% of possible points are guaranteed at least an A-, more than 80% at least a B-, more than 70% at least a C-, and more than 60% at least a D.

Policies

Students are expected to attend all classes and participate in in-class exercises. Attendance does not comprise a formal part of the grade.

Tests and quizzes can be made up with a serious documented excuse (e.g. illness, death in the family) and must be arranged as soon as possible. Arrangements involving other excuses require prior permission from the instructor.

The goal of assignments is to practice the concepts taught in class. While you may discuss assignment questions with others in the class, you are expected to work the problems yourself.

Assignments will be due Friday evening. Late assignments will be accepted with a one-point penalty through the following Sunday. Assignments will generally not be accepted after the Sunday following the due date. Here are guidelines for how the assignments will be graded.

Additional assignments for extra credit will not be offered.

School policies on instructor evaluation, email, plagiarism and incompletes.

Tentative Schedule

Week Topic Text Reading Quiz, Exam Assignment Due
Jan 4 Overview, basic descriptive stats M&M section 1.1    
Jan 9 & 11 Distributions M&M sections 1.2, 1.3   Assignment 1
Jan 16 & 18 Correlation and Regression M&M section 2.1, 2.2, 2.3, 2.4. 2.5 Quiz 1 (Wednesday) Assignment 2
Jan 23 & 25 Regression and Designing empirical studies M&M ch. 2 and ch. 3   Assignment 3
Jan 30 & Feb 1 Empirical studies and probability M&M ch. 3 and section 4.1, 4.2 (as time permits)    
Feb 6 & 8 Expected values and variability M&M section 4.3, 4.4 Midterm exam (Monday) Assignment 4
Feb 13 & 15 Sampling M&M ch. 5   Assignment 5
Feb 20 & 22 Sampling, Confidence intervals M&M ch. 5, M&M section 6.1   Assignment 6
Feb 27 & Mar 1 Confidence Intervals and Hypothesis testing M&M sections 6.1, 7.1, 6.2 Quiz 2 (Wednesday) Assignment 7
Mar 6 & 8 Hypothesis Testing and review M&M sections 6.2, 6.3, 7.2   Assignment 8
Mar 13 (Monday)     Final Exam 2:45 - 5:00