MATH530 Applied Statistics (3 semester hours)

This is an interactive course designed to help students achieve a greater understanding of the statistical methods and models available to analyze data and to solve problems associated with making decisions and testing hypotheses in uncertain conditions. The course is designed for students seeking a thorough appreciation of how statistical tools can support sound decision making efforts in a wide range of situations. Topics covered include inferential statistics, averages, measures of variation, the Normal distribution and its uses, sampling distributions, hypothesis testing for large and small samples, regression and correlation, and Chi-Square distributions. The skills, tools and methodologies needed to analyze systems and to make decisions are provided. State of the art analytical tools and quantitative methods, including computer-based solutions are discussed. The emphasis of the course will be on the proper use of statistical techniques and their implementation rather than on mathematical proofs. However, some mathematics is necessary in order to understand the proper application of the techniques introduced and discussed during the course.