"In a day not far from now, we will be able to break down the barriers of time and space and connect our students on internships or between semesters to the university and to each other and, in that way, create outstanding, interactive educational experiences for them."
President Kim B. Clark
President Kim B. Clark
FDMAT 108 Math for the Real World -- Online
Credits: 3
Estimated Enrollment per Offering: 60 Students
Outcomes
- Acquire basic quantitative skills dealing with percentages, error analysis, numeric paradoxes and other comparisons.
- Learn and apply the practical financial principles of compound interest, debt management, annuities, amortizations, diversified portfolios and tax calculations.
- Discuss the fiscal and political issues of national debt, Social Security and progressive income taxes, tax credits versus deductions, tax-deferred savings.
- Recognize and critique fallacious reasoning in our society and analyze validity and/or soundness in deductive and inductive arguments.
- Describe data using appropriate statistical graphs and numerical summaries as well as pinpoint the misuse of graphical representations.
- Discuss the potential for abuse and misuse of statistics and be able to critique statistical studies found in professional journals.
- Compute the mean, median, mode, standard deviation, five-number summary and other meaningful descriptive statistics.
- Show how to compute the margin of error, randomize samples and interpret level of significance, apply the 68-95-99 and Range Rules of Thumb.
- Gain facility with basic probability rules, At Least Once Rule, law of averages, expected value and gambler's fallacy.
- Understand the differences between linear, exponential and logistic functions when modeling growth and decay as well as the subtleties inherent in population modeling.
- Describe the overshoot and collapse theory, the Rule of 70 and doubling time versus half-life periods in the context of exponential modeling.
Description
A course designed to meet the mathematical needs of the liberal arts student. Topics may include mathematical modeling, regression, finance mathematics, probability, statistics, logic, and mathematical patterns and aesthetics. This course will satisfy both the BYU-Idaho and Idaho Core mathematics requirements but will not serve as a prerequisite to other mathematics courses.
Prerequisites
Math 100B with a grade of "B" or higher or one year of high school algebra.
Required Materials
Textbook:
Access to MyMathLab, which includes the electronic version of the text Using and Understanding Mathematics: A Quantitative Reasoning Approach (4th Edition) by Jeffrey Bennett and William Briggs copyright 2008 - ISBN 0-321-45820-6.
Although Math 108 online only requires access to the MyMathLab/e-book package (detailed above), some students may wish to also purchase an optional printed copy of the text.
Note: even if you purchase a hard copy of the text, you still must have access to the MyMathLab/e-book package in order to take this course.
Technology:
- Scientific Calculator (http://www.ecalc.com/ is free but requires a download; also, some may find a graphing calculator useful for the course but it is not essential because of your access to Excel)
- Microsoft Excel spreadsheet software (the academic edition is fine)
- Microphone for online discussions (a headset or ear phones along with the microphone is prefered)
Course Tools
TBD
